If the parents have been deported and the 2,000 separated children are still in confinement in the United States, the crucial question is how to get them reunited with their parents very quickly. The 1980 Hague Abduction Convention is a potential mechanism to get separated children out of detention and home.

The 1980 Hague Abduction Convention requires that wrongfully retained children must be returned forthwith to their habitual residence. So, by way of example, if Guatemalan parents have been deported to their home country, and the children are still being detained in the United States, the separated parents have a colorable Hague case against the institution holding the children to demand that the children be returned immediately to Guatemala if the parents wish for the child to be returned rather than remain in the United States without the parents.

There are experienced pro bono attorneys standing by throughout the country to help and advance such cases. The law requires that the cases must be filed in the location where the children are actually being detained--and can be filed in federal court. NGOs and other charitable organizations should urgently consider this remedy as soon as they learn the location of a separated child whose parents are no longer themselves in the United States—and get a pro bono Hague attorney involved immediately.

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