MEXICO CITY: The Mexican government has taken the unusual step of issuing a travel alert urging Mexicans working, studying or spending time in Arizona to use extreme caution.
The warning comes in response to the state's tough new immigration measures, which require people to carry proof of their legal right to be in the US and police to check for it.
The US President has asked the Justice Department to review whether the laws are constitutional. Barak Obama called them ''misguided'' and said he wanted more advice on their implications before deciding how to proceed.
The Homeland Security chief, Janet Napolitano, said Justice Department officials had ''deep concerns'' about the laws, which critics fear will encourage racial profiling and discrimination.
The Mexican President, Felipe Calderon, said the measure ''criminalises'' the largely social and economic phenomenon of migration. He warned it would damage long-standing economic, cultural and commercial ties between Mexico and Arizona.
The law ''opens the door to intolerance, to hatred, to discrimination and to abuse'', Mr Calderon said at a meeting of the Institute for Mexicans Abroad, which works on behalf of the millions of Mexicans who live outside the country. The institute called for boycotts of US Airways, whose headquarters are in Tempe, Arizona, and games played by the Arizona Diamondbacks baseball team and the Phoenix Suns basketball team.
The head of Mr Calderon's conservative political party called for a moratorium on all trips to Arizona.
The Mexican Foreign Ministry, in issuing its travel alert, urged Mexicans in Arizona to steer clear of the pro- and anti-immigrant demonstrations that have been taking place in Arizona and to carry all migratory documents at all times.
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