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Just six illegal immigrants volunteered to leave the United States in the first week of a pilot program inviting nearly a half-million people to self-deport, federal officials said.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement program is aimed at more than 450,000 illegal immigrants who have received but ignored court orders to leave the country and who also have no criminal records. It is available in just five cities: Phoenix, Chicago, San Diego, Santa Ana, Calif., and Charlotte, N.C.

The six who signed up by Wednesday evening included an Estonian in Phoenix, an Indian husband and wife and a Guatemalan in Chicago, a Salvadoran in Charlotte and a Mexican in San Diego, said Virginia Kice, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman in San Diego.

The program offers a less disruptive option than arrest and instant jailing by immigration agents who track down immigration fugitives at their homes or workplaces, officials said. It gives those who participate up to three months to wrap up their personal affairs and to know that agents won't be bursting into their homes.

Even though there are few takers so far, Immigration and Customs Enforcement has registered increased reader activity on its Web site, and the agency also has received "more than a handful" of calls with questions about the program to a telephone hot line, ICE spokeswoman Kice said.

Some callers have asked whether the program will be available in more than the five pilot cities. "This was a pilot program that we wanted to undertake to see what kind of a response we'd get," Kice said.

It's modeled after an established self-surrender program that the U.S. Marshals Service uses, Kice said.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has 90 teams nationwide charged with rounding up fugitives who have ignored deportation orders, said Vincent Picard, an agency spokesman in Phoenix.

The agency has been stung by criticism it has received for the raids from members of humanitarian groups who say the arrests often break up families and leave children without their parents.

Picard said the program provides an option to that trauma.

Though Picard and Kice said the program will be evaluated once it ends Aug. 22 to decide whether it has any future, critics have snickered at the whole idea.

"I said they must be out of their minds," said Jon Garrido, a Phoenix entrepreneur and online publisher who writes extensively about Hispanic affairs. "Nobody's going to do that."

Jennifer Allen, executive director of the Tucson-based Border Action Network, an immigrant-rights advocacy organization, said she laughed when she first heard of the program.

"I feel like its 'success' rate speaks for itself," Allen said. Six people interested in participating "speaks to its utility and relevance."

The program shows a lack of understanding of the complexity and reality of immigration, Allen said, noting that some families have members who are citizens whereas others aren't, Allen said.

"If people wanted to go back to Mexico or the country of origin, they would do it on their own," she added.

"People have taken many risks and made many sacrifices to be here, and just because ICE says, 'Come here,' they aren't going to leave everything behind."