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US activists launch month-long protests against immigration policy

San Francisco, Aug 6 

A group of American environmental activists began month-long demonstrations against the .S government's "brutal" policy against immigrants and asylum seekers.

The activists from No Coal in Oakland, a grassroots organization in the California Bay Area, rallied on Monday in front of the headquarters of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in downtown San Francisco to voice their opposition to the government's "brutal" treatment of immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, reports Xinhua news agency.

"For the month of August, there's going to be a demonstration in front of ICE every day of the month by all sorts of different groups to demonstrate their solidarity around the fact that we can't have these concentration camps," Margaret Rossoff, press liaison for Monday's demonstration of Climate Justice, told Xinhua.

Because of the inhumane immigration policy of the current administration, many children were being locked out in jails and families separated, she said.

"The current policies are reprehensible and we are embarrassed and outraged by them," she added.

"The US should make people welcome, rather than closing the doors."

Steve Masover, who is a member with No Coal in Oakland, echoed Rossoff's ideas, saying many people were migrating to the US and also around the world because of floods and other impact of climate change.

"That's why we related climate justice to migrant justice," he said.

Masover noted that the federal government should not make "villains of people who are coming into this country." "There's no reason to do that."

A designer who works for a San Francisco-based company, told Xinhua that he was not officially affiliated with any of the groups protesting in front of the ICE headquarters, but he would come every day for the noon-hour demonstration.

"Everybody is upset that the immigration customs enforcement group is putting children in cages and separating families to enforce (President) Donald Trump's racist policies," he said.

Trump has been implementing a tough and hardline policy on immigration, and has ordered building fences at the US southern borders to keep out immigrants from Central American countries. 

His immigration policy has aroused controversy and uproar in the US.