"In an overzealous attempt to strike at "terror", the US government has actually succeeded in terrorizing hundreds of families in the US and around the world -- families whose relatives have become victims of this war being conducted in the name of national security," said Ahmad Tansheet, of the USHRN and the Muslim Civil Rights Center. "Security and human rights are two sides of the same coin - you cannot have one without the other. And at the moment, Arab and Muslim Americans are confident of neither."

"Military-style policing and criminalization of migrant and other minority communities in the US through wide-scale detentions and deportations are tearing apart families and communities," said Colin Rajah, of the USHRN and the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. "Furthermore, stepped up militarization at US borders under the guise of "defending the homeland against potential terrorists" has caused more rights violations and migrant deaths."

It is therefore imperative that this Commission establishes a new mechanism to monitor the impact of counter-terror measures undertaken by states like the US on human rights generally and migrant rights specifically," said Rajah. "Overall, more than 200,000 Muslims and Arabs have been affected by US government actions carried out on the basis of race, religion and national origin - leaving many American Muslims wondering whether they enjoy the right to live in the US as equal citizens," said Tansheet.

Their complaints reach our domestic policies as well:

"What we are seeing in the US today is a total disregard for the laws and standards of the international community on a number of issues - ranging from the growing number of child offenders on death row and in adult prisons - many of them facing life without the possibility of parole; to the continued denial of the legitimacy of basic economic, social and cultural rights," said the USHRN.