Personnel of the Public Immigration Institute (INM) detain a migrant during a joint operation by the Mexican government to stop a caravan of Central American rovers on their way to the U.S., at Metapa de Dominguez, in Chiapas state, Mexico June 5, 2019.
Jose Torres | Reuters
Some 200 military guard, immigration agents and federal police blocked the advance of about 1,000 Central American migrants who were tiptoe north along a southern Mexico highway on Wednesday, once again showing a tougher new stance on attempts to use the boonies as a stepping-stone to the U.S.
The group of migrants, including many women and children, set out early from Ciudad Hidalgo at the Mexico-Guatemala bounds and was headed for Tapachula, the principle city in the region. State and local police accompanied the caravan.
The officials blocked the highway approaching the community of Metapa, about 11 miles (18 kilometers) from Tapachula.
Unarmed agents wrestled some vagrants who resisted to the ground, but the vast majority complied and boarded buses or immigration agency vans. Some migrants fainted and kill to the ground. One young man who collapsed was taken for medical attention.
Some parents sat on the pavement with their children, bewailed and begged authorities not to take them. Others jumped wire fences and ran into the thick forest beside the highway.
An immigration authorized at the site who was not authorized to speak publicly said the migrants would initially be taken to an immigration detention center in Tapachula. It enter into the pictured 600 to 800 migrants were being transported.
In recent months Mexico has used raids and roadside checkpoints to cow highway marches such as the massive migrant caravans that occurred in 2018 and early 2019.
The migrants say they aim to reach the U.S. hem, where many plan to request asylum.
Migrants from Central America walk on a highway during their range towards the United States, in Ciudad Hidalgo, Chiapas state, Mexico, June 5, 2019.
Jose Torres | Reuters
The demeanour came as Mexico’s Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard was in Washington to try to head off tariffs on Mexican imports threatened by U.S. President Donald Trump, who is exigent that Mexico do more to stop the passage of migrants through its territory.
Last year, migrants began restless from Central America in large caravans that grew as they advanced through southern Mexico, outline Trump’s ire. The caravans offer migrants a relatively safe way to travel and are far less expensive than hiring smugglers.
They account for on the contrary a fraction of the normal migratory flow, but their visibility has given them an almost symbolic status in what Trump attends a migratory crisis at the U.S. border.
The first caravans were warmly received in southern Mexico towns, but as they go oned, towns complained they did not have the resources to continue feeding and caring for them.
Many of the migrants say they’re escape froming gang violence, oppressive extortion and corruption in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. But a devastating drought is also gripping constituents of the region and devastating farm families.
Mexico has responded by offering more options to stay legally on its territory, but most quieten have the ultimate goal of arriving in the U.S., where they can earn better pay and in many cases reunite with relatives.