U.S. to beef up Border Patrol staff
MIAMI (Reuters) -- Facing a flood of millions of illegal immigrants into
the
United States each year, the U.S. Border Patrol is adding 1,000 new agents
to the 8,000 now on its staff, U.S. officials said on Tuesday.
"We're trying to strengthen our border, our southwest border as well as
our
northern border. We're basically trying to maintain control of our border,"
said Dan Kane, a spokesman with the U.S. Immigration & Naturalisation
Service in Washington.
Most of the new agents will be sent to the southwest border with Mexico,
where thousands of illegal immigrants enter the United States each year
from
Mexico and other Latin American nations, many transported by
sophisticated smuggling rings.
Others will be sent to the northern border with Canada, he said.
Border Patrol agents apprehended about 1,555,776 illegal immigrants during
the fiscal year that ended Oct. 31, 1998, the overwhelming majority of
those
along the southwestern border.
An increase in the smuggling of illegal Cuban and Haitian immigrants into
Florida in recent months prompted state officials, including Gov. Jeb Bush,
to seek an increase in the number of Border Patrol agents in the state.
Kane said none of the 1,000 staff the agency is seeking to hire are scheduled
to be added in Florida.
There are an estimated 5 million illegal aliens now residing in the United
States. About half of those are believed to be people who entered legally
but
overstayed their visas. The other half are those who entered illegally.
There currently are 7,357 Border Patrol agents posted on the southwestern
U.S. Border, 289 on the northern border and 54 in Florida, Kane said.
Copyright 1999 Reuters.