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Ärende: Vatican Information Service - Press Release
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                               VIS-Press releases

PROTECT RIGHTS OF MIGRANT WORKERS AND THEIR FAMILIES

VATICAN CITY, JUL 11, 2007 (VIS) - Made public yesterday afternoon was a speech
delivered by Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, secretary of the Pontifical Council
for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant Peoples, during the Global
Forum on Migration and Development, held in Brussels, Belgium from July 9 to
11.

Speaking English, the archbishop recalled how "migrants contribute to their
host country's well-being, and also because of this their human dignity must be
respected and their freedoms guaranteed: the right to a dignified life, to fair
treatment at work, to have access to education, health and other social
benefits, to grow in competence and develop humanly, to freely manifest their
culture and practice their religion.

"But rights and duties go together," he added. "Therefore, at the same time,
migrants have the duty to respect the identity and the laws of the country of
residence, strive for proper integration (not assimilation) into the host
society and learn its language. They are to foster esteem and respect for their
host country, even to the point of loving and defending it.

"Unfortunately, among them there are immigrants in an irregular situation, who,
however, independently of their legal status, have inalienable human dignity.
Therefore their rights must be safeguarded and not ignored or violated. An
irregular migration status, in fact, does not mean criminality. The solution is
better international cooperation that discourages irregularity, with increased
legal channels for migration."

Archbishop Marchetto concluded his talk by renewing the call made by the Pope
in his Message for the World Day of Migrants and Refugees for "governments who
have not yet done so, to ratify the International Convention for the Protection
of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and the Members of their Families."
CON-SM/MIGRATION:DEVELOPMENT/MARCHETTOVIS 070711 (300)

SUMMARY

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