Andrés Manuel López Obrador, during one of his morning conferences last month. Sashenka Gutierrez (EFE)
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has called on his counterparts from Latin America and the Caribbean to hold an emergency summit to develop a common plan to curb migration to the United States. The high-level meeting, scheduled for October 22, comes at a sensitive time in Mexico’s diplomatic relations with the United States. Last week, Washington announced approval to expand the wall on the border between the two countries. , an issue that tarnished the good relations between Joe Biden and López Obrador. In the background, hundreds of migrants crowd Mexico’s northern border every day, waiting to cross the border to apply for legal residency. The worst thing, from López Obrador’s point of view, is everything they have to endure in their transit to the United States, the risks they face in several countries. “We cannot stand idly by, the flow of migrants is increasing sharply,” warned the President in his conference on Monday.
The migration summit will take place in Palenque in the southern state of Chiapas. López Obrador has detailed that he invited Belize leaders Johnny Briceño; Colombia, Gustavo Petro; Costa Rica, Rodrigo Chaves; Cuba, Miguel Diaz-Canel; Ecuador, Guillermo Lasso; El Salvador, Nayib Bukele; Guatemala, Alejandro Giammattei; Haiti, Ariel Henry; Honduras, Xiomara Castro; Panama, Laurentino Cortizo and Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro. Only the heads of state and government of Colombia and Guatemala have not confirmed their participation; The rest will attend in person or send their foreign minister, López Obrador said. Although they are politicians who occupy different positions on the political spectrum from left to right, they have something in common: “They are the countries that have the greatest influence in everything that has to do with migration, be it, because they are the inhabitants of these countries that … “are expatriates or countries through which migrants travel,” López Obrador has indicated.
The president has recounted how migrants in Mexico face various accidents and reported two recent events: the overturning of vehicles full of people, in which several people died and others were injured. It’s just one of the risks. Others are linked to the threat of organized crime, which has brought the world’s worst atrocities against migrants.
A migrant family crosses the Rio Grande from Piedras Negras (Mexico) towards Eagle Pass (USA) on October 6th. ADREES LATIF (Portal)
López Obrador has called on his counterparts to address the causes that lead to the displacement of people from their countries of origin. “It is like an agreement of good neighborliness against poverty, of neighborliness for the well-being of our people, with the aim that with mutual help we can tackle the problem of migration.” “What is happening to the migrants hurts us very much,” he said. “The approach is: What do we do to pay attention to those in the cities of origin who decide to move out of necessity? How do we ensure that there is work and that people in our country are well off?” Countries need to be tempered in order to “reduce the flow of migrants and not just think about coercive measures, checkpoints, walls and the militarization of borders?”, he explained.
The president emphasized that the United States had for the first time expanded the possibilities of issuing legal residence permits to migrants. “Thousands have already been accepted, but [buscamos] that they can carry out this procedure in their countries and not run the risk of traveling through Darién, all of Central America and Mexico, with the suffering that this entails. And also inform the migrant brothers in detail about these risks that traffickers don’t talk about, that they just accuse them and tell them that there will be no problem and that they promise to take them to the other side of the border. ” has said.
In his conference, the President presented graphics that illustrate the increase in migration flows. The figures show that irregular migration at the Mexico-US border increased by 20% between August and September. While displacement among Mexicans has declined, the presence of people of other nationalities has increased dramatically, particularly from Venezuela, Ecuador and Colombia. “We need to address and address the root causes so that there is more dialogue between us and we can work together; “We have a very good relationship with all the governments of these countries,” he explained.
López Obrador has also said that the Mexican government will deliver a diplomatic note of complaint to the governor of Texas, Republican Greg Abbott, whom he accused of implementing hostile measures that have begun to affect economic relations between the two countries. “They are setting up checkpoints on the US side so that there is no free transit, they are hindering the free transit of goods at customs with measures taken by the Texas government.” There is already a response to these measures, which harm both nations and affect economic activity and the normal movement of people diplomatic note issued,” he explained.
On the other hand, the President has announced that he will finally take part in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum (APEC), which this time will be held in San Francisco, USA, under the chairmanship of Peru. López Obrador had previously stated that he would not go to protest against Peruvian President Dina Boluarte, whose government is not recognized as legitimate following the deposition and imprisonment of former President Pedro Castillo. “I didn’t want to be in San Francisco because it’s not a personal matter for the president who got her way [Boluarte], but it’s about not advocating injustice with my presence. However, since they insisted and President Biden has behaved very well, I agreed, I will go,” he commented.
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