Immigrant Detainees on Hunger Strike in South Texas ICE Facility

from http://www.iww.org/en/node/4707:

Immigrant Detainees on Hunger Strike in South Texas ICE Facility

By Greg Rodriguez, grodrigueziww@yahoo.com

Rio Grande Valley, South Texas --It is known that nearly one-hundred of the immigrants being detained at the Department of Homeland Security(DHS)/Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s(ICE) Port Isabel Detention Center (PIDC) have been on a hunger strike since April 22, 2009. PIDC is a prison used to detain immigrants arrested by the United States government. It is located in an extremely isolated area of the remote South Texas town called Los Fresnos.

The detainees have resorted to this form of non-violent direct action after months of demanding adequate medical attention and an end to abuses by guards; to no avail.

The responsible parties are DHS, ICE and more specifically, Field Director for ICE - Michael J. Pitts - who has been trying to break up the hunger strike by planning the isolation of participants, pressuring them to eat, and calling for the speedy deportation of detainees engaging in the strike – tactics which will not solve the problems, but instead deny justice to the struggling detainees. Dora Schriro, Special Advisor on ICE and Detention/Removal to DHS, is also among the responsible heads for her failure to report to the public on the conditions at PIDC.

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