Mexico on Tuesday warned its citizens about travel in Arizona in response to a tough new anti-immigration law that has provoked fury in Mexico and across the Americas.
The law, signed by Arizona’s Republican Governor Jan Brewer on Friday, allows police to question and detain anyone they believe may be an illegal immigrant, even if they are not suspected of committing another crime.
The move unleashed anger on both sides of the border, with Californian lawmakers on Tuesday calling for an economic boycott of Arizona and a Mexican airline warning that it may cancel more flights to the southern US state.
Mexico’s Foreign Ministry advised nationals to carry identity documents and respect Arizona law, warning of “an adverse political atmosphere for migrant communities and for all Mexican visitors.”
“It should be assumed that any Mexican citizen could be bothered and questioned for no significant reason at any moment,” the statement said, adding that the law would not be applied for several months.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Monday slammed the law as “racial discrimination” and said his government would “use all means at its disposal” to defend its nationals.
He said the law threatened links of friendship, business, tourism and culture between Mexico and Arizona.
Mexican opposition parties and migrants have called for a commercial boycott of the southern US state, as businesses fear negative repercussions.
“Without a doubt it will affect the traffic of travelers between Mexico and that state [Arizona],” Aeromexico chief executive Andres Conesa told journalists at a tourism conference in Acapulco on Tuesday.
Aeromexico already closed routes between the Mexican cities of Mexico City and Guadalajara and Phoenix in Arizona in recent months, he said.
“We’ve lowered the number of flights there significantly due to the way our compatriots are treated,” Conesa said.
In Sonora, the Mexican state bordering Arizona, the government symbolically canceled an annual meeting with Arizona officials, according to its Web site, but it said that it would seek to maintain good relations.
North of the border, the legislation has provoked a wave of criticism, including from US President Barack Obama, and ignited a legal and political row as Democrats consider launching a comprehensive immigration reform bid.
Lawmakers in San Francisco and Los Angeles on Tuesday called for a boycott, which would include severing contracts with Arizona firms and encouraging private firms to cease doing business with the state.
US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said that US justice officials had “deep concerns” about the law and that the Justice Department was reviewing whether it met “constitutional safeguards.”
The US Catholic Church, meanwhile, warned that the law could impact the whole country.
“It certainly would lead to the rise in fear and distrust in immigrant communities,” Bishop John Wester said in a statement issued on behalf of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Mexico, which shares a 3,200km border with the US, is believed to have about 12 million nationals in the US, with half of them undocumented or illegal.
Arizona estimates it has about 460,000 illegal immigrants, mostly from Latin America.
Ecuador on Tuesday followed Honduras and Guatemala in condemning the Arizona law, and Amnesty International called for it to be abolished.
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