from the July 07, 2005 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0707/p01s04-woam.html
Now departing for Mexico: one-way flights for illegals A US-funded program returns Mexicans deep into the country.
By Danna Harman Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
MEXICO CITY - Someone must have told them it was cold in the desert at night, as they are all wearing sweatshirts. They disembark the charter flight and shuffle into a hangar behind Mexico City's International Airport. Looking down, most miss the sign strung up cheerfully across the wall that reads, "Bienvenidos" - welcome.
They have not been gone long, really. A week, maybe 10 days. They left their homes in Puebla or Oaxaca, Veracruz or Chiapas, put a bar of soap and an extra pair of jeans in a knapsack, hugged their families farewell, and headed north across the US-Mexico border into Arizona.
Now, they are back, their journey cut short by the US Border Patrol, and their return home speeded by a US taxpayer-funded program that flies illegal immigrants caught at the border back home. "Their smugglers are saying, 'Try crossing again and again,'" says US Border Patrol spokesman Salvador Zamora, "and we are saying, 'Let us get you out of here.... The desert is filled with death."
Last year, 330 migrants died crossing the 261-mile Arizona border, 124 of them in the Sonoran Desert, according to the Mexican consulate in Tucson, Ariz. They lost their lives to snakes and scorpions, to bandits and - in the summer months, when temperatures soar into the triple digits - to heatstroke and dehydration. Arizona regularly sees more migrants trying to cross its frontier - and more deaths - than any other border state.
In the past, immigrants who were caught trying to enter Arizona (700,000 last year, according to US Border Patrol statistics) were bused back and released. From there, many simply started the journey all over again.
