Andrés Manuel López Obrador recognized this Wednesday a 31% increase in migrant apprehensions at the border between Mexico and the United States over the last month. The President provided figures from the US Border Patrol (CBP) on the increase in border crossings between the first week of November, which was 53,016, and the first week of December, which reached 69,462. The President presented these data in the context of the unilateral closure of three border posts by the United States, which has once again aggravated the situation at the border.
In the first week of this month, 9,923 people were arrested each day trying to cross into the United States from Mexico. Of those, 2,398 are Mexican and 7,525 are other nationalities, according to CBP figures. Based on these numbers, the Mexican government estimates that 307,000 people will be held at the border by the end of the year (including nearly 75,000 from Mexico). That number would even surpass data from September of this year, the highest CBP has to date of 269,000 migrants detained at the southern border of the United States.
On November 27, the United States government decided to close the passage of people and vehicles from Mexico on the border bridge connecting Piedras Negras, Coahuila, to Eagle Pass, Texas. The CBP said it made this decision due to the increase in irregular border crossings: “The United States continues to experience an increase in migrant encounters at the southwest border.” The US agency's goal was to at least at least arrest the agents who normally deal with human trafficking to be in charge of migration until the end of the “emergency”. “CBP is strengthening all available resources to process migrants expeditiously and safely,” the agency said in a statement.
After Eagle Pass, they closed the route from Sonoyta, Sonora, to Lukeville, Arizona on December 4th. John R. Modlin, head of the Border Patrol in the Tucson region, which includes Lukeville, assured that even the staff in charge of social networks will be reduced: “At this time, all available personnel are required to deal with the unprecedented flow of migrants On December 9, the pedestrian crossing from El Chaparral in Tijuana, Baja California, to San Ysidro, California, one of the busiest borders in the world, was closed.
Faced with the closure of three important border posts, the Mexican government has called on its neighbor to “immediately resume operations at the affected border crossings in order to avoid significant economic losses on both sides of the border”: “The implementation of the unilateral measures will have a negative impact on the Trade and tourism in the region,” the State Department said in a statement on Tuesday.
For his part, López Obrador has tried to downplay the situation: “This problem is being resolved. In fact, this border is overloaded and measures are already being taken. I hope that the situation at the bridges and border crossings will return to normal soon.” “These cases can be presented like the Texas case; They have already happened, but it is only temporary, they will be fixed soon. “It is in all of our interests that communication is maintained, for the sake of the transportation of people, which is the most important thing, and also the transportation of goods,” said the president, who also argued that the United States closed the border crossings because “Sometimes they don't. “They have enough staff for customs inspection.”
In addition, the President reiterated the need to address the causes of migration in their countries of origin. “I will continue to insist that measures must be taken so that people are not forced to leave their communities and cities. If we look at them by country, we see that where there is more need, there is more poverty, there is more migration, and also where there is political conflict,” he noted. However, according to CBP, from October 2022 to September 2023 alone, 717,300 Mexicans were arrested while attempting to enter the United States. During the same period there were 266,000 Venezuelans; 213,000 Hondurans; 159,000 Colombians and 100,000 Nicaraguans.
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