Bush Backs Security Fence

Just north of the corroded old metal fence that crosses the white sand Pacific beach where Mexico meets California a green carpet of low-lying shrubs emerges.

It stretches up the coast, crossing the Tijuana river estuary, and continues east along the canyon-dotted border.

The area is an internationally recognised wetlands reserve which environmentalists say is home to 370 species of birds, several of them endangered. They also say that this unusually well-preserved habitat could disappear if the US department of homeland security is allowed to build an impenetrable triple-fence security zone along the side of the reserve.

The environmentalists have come together with human rights groups from both sides of the border who argue that the security zone will do little more than rechannel existing migrant flows and increase the risks migrants face. But they are fighting what seems to be a losing battle against the Bush administration's determination to seal the southern frontier.

Last year protesters received a boost when the California Coastal Commission blocked the $58m (£32m) project on the grounds that the impact on the 2,500-acre wetlands reserve was not justifiable. But last week George Bush signed legislation that gives a green light to the security zone, permits or no permits.

"The fence project as designed could destroy the reserve that we have worked so hard to preserve over decades," says Mike McCoy, a veteran conservationist. "It is absolutely asinine to do this."

The new rules give the director of homeland security the right to override environmental laws and regulations which hamper projects that he or she believes are essential. The fence looks set to become the first test case.

"I'm not real happy about going through our parks, but that's reality, this is what is needed," says Mike Hance, the local border patrol special agent with responsibility for infrastructure.

The security zone would link up with the next nine miles of frontier, which have already been partially fortified with two new fences. The new fences would seal off the California city of San Diego and its suburban freeways, strip malls and motels from the chaotic urban sprawl of Tijuana in Mexico.

Environmentalists worry less about the fences themselves than the plans to partially fill in several canyons to flatten out the gradients. They fear that the resulting erosion could silt up the estuary and block the daily tidal flushing mechanism that keeps the reserve's ecosystem alive.

The fence plan has gone down particularly badly south of the border, where Mexicans are angered by a perceived xenophobic undertone.

The project comes in the middle of a series of anti-immigrant actions in the US including a crackdown on illegal workers being given driving licences and the setting up of border vigilante groups.

Mexico's foreign minister, Luís Ernesto Derbéz, called the fence "unacceptable". He promised a formal diplomatic complaint and said he would explore legal options against the fence on human rights grounds.

Migrants' rights groups also insist that while the fence may succeed in sealing this tiny section of the 2,000-mile border, it will do little to deter well over a million poverty-stricken Mexicans from heading northwards every year.

"People desperate for jobs will always find other routes," said Esmeralda Liu, coordinator of the Mexico-based Coalition for the Defence of Migrants. "They will go to more dangerous places and more will die."

This trend has become clear in the last decade, during which resources have been ploughed into security in San Diego. While the number of people apprehended has plummeted, such figures have risen dramatically elsewhere and annual migrant deaths on the border as a whole have climbed to more than 400.

But none of this dents the determination of Special Agent Hance, who believes the triple fence could be just the beginning. "Our primary mission is to make sure nobody enters illegally and if the government puts enough resources in we can hold it all. It is possible," he said.

"It is just a matter of time."