‘US policies in Central America fueled migrations’

ANKARA, 22 June 2019 [Fik/News Sources]: As thousands of migrants flock to the borders along the Mexico, an expert here believed that the problem was created by the U.S. itself, by engineering military and covert operations and also by economic interventions, in the Central American nations over past many decades.

According to Carmen Monico of Elon University, violence and instability in the region instigated by the U.S. has, in fact, led to large scale migrations in the region.

The professor of human service studies, who has conducted an extensive research on the subject, added that the U.S. administration's decision on Tuesday to slash aid to poor countries in Central America is "counterproductive".

She said the foreign assistance could have addressed the root causes of migration, such as violence and poverty.

Earlier in the week, U.S. State Department said no additional foreign aid will be provided for Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, until they take "concrete actions to reduce the number of illegal migrants coming to the U.S. border."

The State Department added that the U.S. will "reprogram those funds to other priorities", referring to $370 million aid money, which was earmarked for three countries in the 2018 budget.

President Donald Trump has been using the aid card to block the arrival of Hispanic migrants and asylum seekers from Central American countries to the U.S. borders in line with his "America first" agenda.

U.S. thinks that aid cuts will force the governments of those countries, to do their homework and create the political will to tackle the problem at its source.