Immigration dominates Cancun summit

By James Westhead BBC News, Cancun

President Bush told his counterparts he was making progress on immigration reform

As the sleek black limousines of the presidential motorcade swept past at alarmingly high speed, Carlos Aguila Rosado paused from his work to watch, leaning thoughtfully on his spade.

"I hope something good will come out of this meeting for Mexicans," he said in Spanish. "The eyes of the world are on Cancun."

The labourer from the neighbouring Yucatan province and his fellow workers were planting new palm trees along a coastal resort strip still recovering from the devastation of last year's Hurricane Wilma, one of the worst Atlantic storms in history.

"Many of my cousins are living and working in the US illegally. I know they earn well, but I don't want to go. It is too dangerous to cross the border and I have a wife and family."

The economic gulf between Mexico and the US is nowhere more obvious than in Cancun - a holiday playground for American tourists who earn on average six times more than their Mexican neighbours.

It has been an appropriate backdrop for a summit dominated by the thorny issue of immigration.

Immigration protests

An estimated six million of Carlos's fellow countrymen are currently living illegally in the US and thousands more risk the journey across the border every week usually paying hundreds of dollars to "coyotes" - or people-smugglers - who sometimes abandon them in the desert.

In my opinion Mexicans ought to be allowed to work in the States. They're needed and after all much of it used to belong to them Linda Shapansky US tourist

A fierce debate has erupted in the US where the House of Representatives has passed a tough bill criminalising undocumented migrants and proposing the creation of a security fence along 700 miles of the 2,000-mile-long border to keep out any more.

The legislation has sparked mass protests by immigrants and students in several American cities.

President Bush is backing an alternative plan tightening border security but also giving millions of immigrants legal status as "guest workers".

Cancun was appropriate backdrop for a summit dominated by immigration

At a joint news conference at the end of the two-day summit, President Bush told the Mexican leader Vicente Fox and the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper he was making progress on immigration reform.

"A nation of laws can also be a welcoming nation. A guest worker programme can get rid of these coyotes who smuggle people in the back of eighteen wheelers."

He added, " I believe it's important to bring people out of the shadows of American society so they don't have to fear the life they live."

Mexicans 'needed in US'

President Vicente Fox who has been waiting more than four years for immigration reform to reach the agenda in Washington welcomed the US president's optimism.

He stressed that Mexico recognised it had a shared responsibility and was doing all it could to help reduce the flow of illegal immigrants, including those passing through from South American countries.

However he recognised that ultimately immigration reform would be decided in the US Congress which is currently debating the measures.

The immigration issue overshadowed Canadian complaints about US lumber tariffs and a tough new requirement on Canadians entering the States to carry passports and not merely driving licences as in the past.

Outside the hotel where the final news conference was taking place, two passing American holiday-makers said they could not wait for the summit to finish.

Linda Shapansky complained "the security is so tight we haven't even been allowed to go diving in the sea".

When asked what she thought about the immigration issue she said: "In my opinion Mexicans ought to be allowed to work in the States. They're needed and after all much of it used to belong to them."