Nation IN BRIEF : NEW YORK : Border Woes Laid to Trade Policies

An advisory panel will recommend to Congress next month the use of foreign aid to curtail illegal immigration from parts of Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, according to a New York Times report. The 12-member Commission for the Study of International Migration and Cooperative Economic Development, headed by Diego Asencio, a former ambassador to Brazil and Colombia, concluded that some U.S. trade policies, such as import quotas, had the unintended effect of retarding foreign economic growth and encouraging illegal immigration. The panel’s report will also call for a free-trade agreement between the United States and Mexico such as the one signed in 1988 between the United States and Canada.