Should foreigners be required to register with the government? Males as young as 16 from 23 countries, most with large Muslim populations, have been ordered to report to federal officials. (opinion).

YES The U.S. government's initiative to require the registration of male aliens from mostly Muslim countries has prompted an outcry from civil libertarians, ethnic advocacy groups, and the mainstream media. But considering that the U.S. is waging a savage war--one started on American soil by foreign-born combatants--the initiative is a fair-minded and prudent national security measure.

American history records the registration of aliens as a long-standing government policy, dating back to the outbreak of world war. Additionally, it is the nearly universal practice of foreign governments to require the registration of noncitizens visiting their countries. An American studying in Germany, for instance, would be expected to register with the German government.

There is merit to the concern that the registration program targets specific ethnicities. But considering that the current threat comes mostly from the predominantly Muslim countries, the INS cites, the U.S. would be derelict in its national security duty were it to do anything else--at least, for now.

Last year, the Center for Immigration Studies released a study of the immigration status of 48 foreign-born, militant Islamic terrorists who committed or were charged with committing acts of terrorism in the U.S. Nearly half of those 48 terrorists violated U.S. immigration law at some point. It's reasonable to assume, therefore, that strict enforcement of immigration law would result in the apprehension of some, though not all, Al Qaeda operatives and their like. And it is true that dozens of fugitives have been arrested in the execution of the current registration program.

Yes, we should monitor closely any ethnic-specific program sponsored by our government, and refuse to tolerate one in times of peace. But for now we ought to demand comprehensive enforcement of our immigration laws, without which we can most assuredly expect further acts of barbarism here in the future.

JOHN KELLEY
Director of Communications
Center for Immigration Studies

NO Requiring foreigners from certain countries to register with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) is expensive, inefficient, and counterproductive to our national security. The policy does not make us safer, and violates some of our most sacred American principles.

On December 16, 500 to 700 boys and men were arrested and detained in Los Angeles, after voluntarily waiting in line to be interviewed. The INS claimed that these boys and men were in technical violation of immigration law. Yet according to immigration attorneys, many had filed the necessary paperwork to remedy the situation.

To protect our security, we need everyone's help, especially the Muslim community's. Yet these special registrations have only frightened innocent people into not cooperating. Immigrants with information relating to terrorism might now be too scared to come forward. Besides, if you were a terrorist, would you wait in line at 5 a.m. to register? Probably not.

This policy is a tremendous waste of government resources. There are millions of immigrants from Muslim countries in the United States. We should not waste our time fingerprinting and interviewing every one of them. Searching for a needle in a haystack is a bad law-enforcement technique. Let's concentrate efforts on those with a clear connection to violence.

Furthermore, this policy unfairly targets people based on their ethnicity and religion. INS special registration is tantamount to fingerprinting all African-American males because a small percentage of them commit crimes. Not only is this discriminatory, but we would miss all criminals of all other races. Would this registration have caught Timothy McVeigh, a white male responsible for the Oklahoma City bombing in 1994? No.

In America, we are proud of our policy of people being innocent until proven guilty. Let's not sacrifice our principles for a discriminatory policy that does not provide security.

SARAH ELTANTAWI
Communications Director,
Muslim Public Affairs Council