HispanicBusiness

Arrests of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. Borber Patrol's EL Paso sector have declined for the sixth straight year, local media reported.

The shrinking number of arrests in the EL Paso sector, which includes all of New Mexico, mirrors a six-year decline in immigrants caught along the entire U.S. Southwest border with Mexico, according to the daily newspaper Albuquerque Journal.

The U.S. Border Patrol arrested 327,577 people attempting to cross the nation's Southern border last fiscal year, down from 447, 731 the previous year and the most recent peak of 1.6 million in 2000.

In the El Paso sector, patrol agents arrested 10,345 illegal border-crossers in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, a 15.5 percent decline from the previous year and a 91 percent drop from the most recent high in 2005, said Albuquerque Journal.

Border Patrol officials attributed the decline in border arrests to fewer people who are trying to cross the border as well as the efficient work of border agents and infrastructure.

The number of Border Patrol agents assigned to the El Paso sector rose from 1,036 in 2000 to more than 2,700 this year, El Paso sector spokesman Doug Mosier was quoted as saying.

Other factors that contributed to the decline include the construction of substations close to the border, the foundering U. S. economy, and a get-tough policy in which Border Patrol agents refer nearly all illegal crossers for prosecution in federal court, according to the report.