E/CN.4/2002/94/Add.1 page 18 52. Interviews conducted in Lago Agrio indicated that most Colombians are migrants engaging in informal trading. It was also reported that Colombians are members of criminal gangs in the area or are smugglers. Colombians are intensely stigmatized as violent and non-law-abiding. The population of Lago Agrio attribute the rise in crime to the growing immigration from Colombia. 53. In Santo Domingo de los Colorados, it was reported that there are between 22,000 and 25,000 Colombians, of whom only 8,500 enjoy official status (by virtue of registration as migrants), while the migration status of 1,500 more is under consideration. The Municipality of Santo Domingo indicated that during 2001 between 3,500 and 4,000 Colombians displaced by the consequences of Plan Colombia had arrived, and that an official request had been made to be included in the National Contingency Plan. 54. The Special Rapporteur was concerned to learn of the exploitation of Colombians who settle in agricultural estates and are used as cheap labour or work in exchange for food and shelter. Also of concern are reports of smuggling of persons in the area of Santo Domingo and the departure of hundreds of inhabitants from the area via illegal migration routes, using the networks operating at the coast. Lastly, emphasis should be placed on a problem of which the Special Rapporteur was informed by several sources, and which also occurs in Santo Domingo, in connection with the use of the “late registration” procedure by foreigners in order to acquire Ecuadorian citizenship illegally. 55. In the context of the Migration Act, mention should be made of the grounds for the exclusion of foreigners laid down in article 9,12 which are of concern to the Special Rapporteur because of their discriminatory nature and their incompatibility with international human rights standards. The grounds include: diseases deemed to be serious, chronic and infectious; sexual deviance or progressive general paralysis, including habitual alcoholism, epilepsy, cretinism, blindness, and generally all handicaps which prevent the sufferers from working; illiteracy in persons aged over 15 and gigantism. 56. The expulsion procedure, known as deportation proceedings and described in chapter V of the Act, is initiated ex officio by the General Intendant of Police. It is noteworthy that the decision of the Intendant to issue the deportation order is not subject to administrative or judicial appeal, in violation of the provisions of article 13 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Ecuador is a party. 57. In the prison establishments she visited, the Special Rapporteur noted that some of the foreign prisoners had had contacts with their consular representatives while being held. However, the situation of many prisoners from countries with no consular representation offers cause for concern. Testimony was received from persons who had had no consular assistance, and could not speak Spanish or English, but had nevertheless been tried without even being able to communicate with their defence counsel, for lack of interpreters. Most of those persons came from African, East European and Asian countries.