US' illegal immigration border patrols may increase

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The month-long patrols that monitored illegal immigration in Arizona may soon pop up elsewhere in the US.

The organizer of the Minuteman Project -- where nearly 900 volunteers, some of them armed, patrolled the Arizona border in April for the Minuteman Project -- says similar watches are planned for California and along the Canadian border.

Chris Simcox says his group has 15,000 members and will continue monitoring the borders until the federal government begins military patrols.

He made the remarks at a two-day summit of several anti-illegal-immigration groups in Las Vegas. Outside, about 200 Hispanic protesters denounced the meeting as racist.

Organizers say the watches resulted in the arrests of hundreds of illegal immigrants. But critics of the program, including Border Patrol officials, have said the group was little more than a nuisance.