In conjunction with the War Against Trafficking Alliance, the State Department sponsored a three-day conference this week devoted to discussions of strategies for fighting sex trafficking and rehabilitating victims. More than 100 nations were represented, by border guards, judges and vice presidents. Among those speaking were Attorney General John Ashcroft, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. As many as 4 million women and children are estimated to be trafficked annually into countries such as Jamaica , Saudi Arabia , France and the United States .

"Sex trafficking is more than just a serious violation of the law," Ashcroft said. "It is an affront to human dignity. It is an assault on human values."

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Last weekend in San Antonio , a Border Patrol agent shot and killed Juan Patricio Peraza Quijada, 19, of Mexicali , after he allegedly tried to strike the agent with a metal pipe. On Monday Mexican officials in El Paso charged that the agent used excessive force and will ask the FBI and other government agencies to investigate the shooting. Quijada was approached by two agents who suspected he might have been in the United States illegally, when he fled with the agents in pursuit. Officials say he threw a ladder at one of the agents, striking him, and that he also threatened them with a metal pipe. According to the report, agents warned Quijada to release his weapon, but he instead attacked, and the agent opened fire. He was transported to Thomason Hospital and pronounced dead.

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The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a U.S. District decision dismissing a lawsuit challenging the indefinite detention of Haitian asylum seekers. District Judge Joan Lenard wrote in his ruling of May 2002 that politicians in Washington - and not the courts - hold the keys to freedom for Haitian asylum seekers held in detention. The lawsuit was filed by several Miami immigration attorneys on behalf of more than 240 Haitian migrants who arrived in South Florida in December 2001. Of that group, 11 adults and one minor remain in INS custody.

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Walther Velasquez, 37, an employee in the Delray Beach office of the Social Security Administration, faces federal charges of supplying false Social Security numbers to illegal immigrants and is linked to a counterfeiting ring based in Boston . Velasquez was indicted on 12 counts relating to the counterfeiting of Social Security cards for illegal immigrants. He is being held in Palm Beach County Jail without bond. Officials say the ring of counterfeiters has taken in about $4.3 million in the scheme.

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The U.S. State Department says it has approved plans for the United States to open its doors to 12,000 Somali Bantus, a people devastated by massacre and rape after Somalia crumbled into civil war in 1991 and have languished in Kenyan refugee camps for the last dozen years. Metro Atlanta will be one of the top destinations for Somali Bantus, who will be sent to cities in 31 states, including Dallas , Houston , Phoenix and Salt Lake City . Few of them speak English, and many cannot read or write even in their native language. The refugees will have a difficult time adjusting to the modern world, but they will escape a legacy of persecution and have opportunities to work and educate themselves.

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The Fresno County Sheriff's Department will formally recognize a Mexican matricula consular cards as identification, Sheriff Richard Pierce announced Monday. The Sheriff's Department joins several banks and 25 other sheriff's departments in California to recognize the card as valid identification, but it will be the largest agency in the area to do so yet. Advocates for tighter immigration limits criticized the move, saying most who hold the cards are illegal aliens. Pierce responds by saying that police need to identify people, many of whom are victims of crime. He said that accepting the cards will encourage people to step forward when they are witnesses to crimes without fearing deportation.

Thirteen states accept the matricula consular cards in issuing driver's licenses, as does 800 police departments; and more than 80 cities, among them Grand Rapids, Los Angeles, Chicago, Denver, Houston, Dallas, Austin and Fort Worth. The ID card's use has been rejected by New York State and New York City .

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The family of Jesica Santillan, the teenager who died after a botched heart-lung transplant, fear burying the girl in their native Mexico because they would not be able to return to the United States , said family friends. The family entered the country illegally to seek medical care for the girl; they paid smugglers to sneak them across the border. Jesica died two days after receiving a second heart and lung transplant. Surgeons had mistakenly transplanted organs of the wrong blood type in the first operation, and Jesica was near death by the time the second surgery began.

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A report by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine says that the INS has been ineffective at deporting illegal aliens and fails to properly expel foreigners who may include potential terrorists. The report found that only 13 percent of illegal aliens who have been ordered out of the country, but have not been detained, have actually left. Almost 94 percent of those who were held in the agency's custody were removed. Only six percent of illegal foreigners from countries identified by the United States as "sponsors of terrorism" not under arrest ever left the country after being ordered deported, and the INS expelled just three percent of illegal aliens whose asylum applications were denied.

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Most members of Congress believe Canada is a wide-open gateway for terrorists seeking to enter the United States , Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) told a conference on Canada-U.S. relations Thursday. Collins chairs the Senate committee that oversees the new Department of Homeland Security, which will be responsible for security along the Canada-U.S. border.

"Canadian immigration is looser than in the U.S. and more porous and represents a vulnerability," she said.

Senator Collins grew up in Caribou, Maine , and is said to have crossed the border regularly into Canada .

"Those who do not live in border states and don't have the daily experience of crossing the border believe we really need to regain control of our borders," Collins said.

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Thirty-seven illegal workers were arrested in an INS raid this week at the Francis E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne , home to the country's largest strategic missile-defense unit.

Officials said the presence of undocumented workers at the Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile unit was an egregious breach of security but that they did not believe the employees were on the base to harm the United States .

Base spokesman Kenneth Smith said the unlawful employees were working for a subcontractor at two construction sites. The investigation found that some of the workers had bogus papers and ID cards, he said.