Ethics Newsline®

NANTES, France
With the French government threatening a crackdown on illegal immigration, possibly involving the deportation of families and schoolchildren, many French are vowing to hide the immigrants from authorities, according to a report last week from the Christian Science Monitor.

Monitor correspondent Susan Sachs writes, “At a time when the French parliament is in the final stages of drafting a tough new immigration law and French politicians worry openly about assimilating even legal immigrants, the plight of such families has drawn ordinarily apolitical people into a volatile national debate.”

The current situation evolved after Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy promised to increase the number of deportations but backed off after protests over the removal of some students during the school year. Sarkozy agreed to hold off on the deportation of students until the end of the school year on July 4.

Now, the French press carries frequent reports of families who are shifting children among various safe houses and vowing to shelter them from authorities, the Monitor reported.

The immigration situation has become acute throughout most of Europe, according to an analysis from the International Herald Tribune. In France, young immigrants and their children now account for one in four of all residents under the age of 25. More than half of the babies born in the Netherlands are to parents of non-Dutch origin.

Because of the small size and crowded conditions of European nations, immigration appears to be an even more combustible issue in Europe than it is in the United States, the Tribune reported.