Leaders from more than 160 countries — but not the U.S. — gathered in Marrekesh, Morocco, Monday to approve an international agreement aimed at doing more to help migrants.
The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration was signed just days after the State Department said the United Nations was using the process to “advance global governance at the expense of the sovereign right of States to manage their immigration systems in accordance with their national laws, policies, and interests.”
The U.S. also warned the deal had the potential to limit free press.
“Calls in the Compact to prevent all instances of intolerance against foreign nationals or to promote certain perspectives for media professionals in how they report on or characterize migrants raise concerns about respect for freedom of opinion and expression and media freedom, core tenets upon which the United States was founded,” the State Department said in a statement. “We are also concerned that this language in the Compact could be abused by repressive regimes that seek to limit speech unduly.”
The deal is nonbinding and does not include specific plans for how each country will enhance its practices related to migrants.
Signatories to the deal started working on it in 2016. The final version included 23 objectives for how to improve the handling of global migration and reiterated a commitment to protect them. More than a quarter of a billion people live in a country other than the one they were born in, according to the U.N.
While the pact isn’t binding, some populist leaders in European countries warned the document overstepped national sovereignty.
The State Department on Friday called it “an effort by the United Nations to advance global governance at the expense of the sovereign right of states.”
“The United States proclaims and reaffirms its belief that decisions about how to secure its borders, and whom to admit for legal residency or to grant citizenship, are among the most important sovereign decisions a State can make, and are not subject to negotiation, or review, in international instruments, or fora,” the U.S. government said. The United States maintains the sovereign right to facilitate or restrict access to our territory, in accordance with our national laws and policies, subject to our existing international obligations.”
The U.S. pulled out of talks in 2017. Since then, Australia, Austria, Chile, the Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Hungary, Latvia, Poland, and Slovakia have also dropped out.
The U.N. General Assembly is scheduled to adopt the agreement next week.
