MATAMOROS, Mexico – Representatives from the governments of the United States and Mexico will meet in Washington in January to advance efforts to address the growing flow of migrantswhich has caused a headache for Joe Biden's government in the middle of the American election campaign.
This was one of the agreed points at the meeting between President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, according to a joint statement by both governments released on Thursday.
The meeting coincided with Mexican authorities dismantling a precarious migrant tent camp along the Rio Grande in the border city of Matamoros, an event that could likely be a sign of actions coming from Mexico to accommodate the growing number of migrants arriving at the southern border of the United States.
The temporary closure of two border rail crossings in Texas was a clear signal that the United States must do more to prevent migrants from boarding freight trains, buses and trucks to reach the border.
Amid desperation for these border crossings to be opened to the transfer of its goods, Mexico is showing early signs that it will cooperate with migration efforts.
What happened in Matamoros was a clear example, while Blinken met with López Obrador in the Mexican capital.
The meeting came after a phone call Biden had with his Mexican counterpart on December 20 to express his administration's concerns about the growing influx of migrants at the southern border of the United States, where up to 12,000 illegal crossings are detected daily became. López Obrador reported on Thursday. Because of this call, they both decided to look for a solution together.
In late 2022, migrants settled on the riverfront across from Brownsville, Texas, and the camp once housed up to 1,500 migrants, but in recent months many tents have been cleared out as migrants crossed the river to reach the United States.
Segismundo Doguín, head of the National Migration Institute in Tamaulipas, the state where Matamoros is located, denied that it was an eviction. “What we are doing is that the tent we see is empty, the tent we are removing … well, the migrants are already starting to leave,” he told AP.
But Jose, a Honduran migrant who only wanted to give his first name, said some of the 200 remaining migrants were virtually forced to leave the camp late Tuesday.
“They drove us all away,” he said. As he explained, they were given little time to remove their tents and belongings from the road and felt intimidated by the excavator moving between the tents. The migrants, he added, “had to run for their lives, otherwise an accident could happen.”
The caravan of several thousand migrants of around twenty nationalities is advancing from Mexico's southern border.
Some of the migrants moved into a fenced area of the camp designated by immigration officials, but that did not allay their fears.
About 70 migrants jumped into the river on Tuesday evening and crossed the border into the USA. They were trapped for hours on the banks under rows of barbed wire installed by order of the Texas governor.
Migrants forced to leave the camp have few options, said Glady Cañas, founder of the Matamoros-based nongovernmental organization Helping Them Triunfar.
“Well, the truth is the shelters are overwhelmed,” he said.
Cañas was at the camp on Wednesday, where he walked among tents encouraging migrants to avoid entering the United States illegally, especially after several people drowned in recent days.
They talked about the economy and a commitment was made to activate train services and regulate border crossings.
AFFECTED MEXICAN INDUSTRY
Mexican industry was hit last week by the temporary closure of two railroad crossings into Texas on the grounds that border patrol agents needed to be redeployed to handle the high number of immigration crossings.
Another border crossing in Lukeville, Arizona, remained closed, and operations were partially suspended in San Diego and Nogales, also in Arizona.
López Obrador noted in his morning conference on Thursday that delegates from both governments are committed to holding regular meetings to promote orderly migration and strengthen cooperation in addressing the economic and social causes that lead to it Thousands of people are leaving their homes.
These are the most common. To see more from Telemundo, visit https://www.nbc.com/networks/telemundo
THE OBLIGATIONS OF BOTH GOVERNMENTS
As part of the cooperation policy, both governments also committed to intensifying efforts to “interrupt human trafficking, human trafficking and criminal networks,” the joint statement said.
“We must be vigilant so that the border crossings are not closed,” the Mexican president said as he reiterated the administration's priority that the United States reopen the border crossings. “More than ever, a good neighborhood policy with the United States is crucial,” he added.
For his part, Blinken also praised the results of the meeting held on Wednesday in the Mexican capital, saying in a message on his X account, formerly Twitter, that Washington is committed to Mexico to address various challenges, including addressing irregular migration, the reopening of border crossings and the fight against fentanyl and other synthetic drugs.
Blinken was accompanied by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and White House National Security Adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall.
Mexico already has more than 32,000 Armed Forces and National Guard agents, about 11% of its armed forces, assigned to enforcing immigration laws.
How many people are in the caravan?
But the shortcomings of that measure became clear on Tuesday when elements of the National Guard made no attempt to stop a caravan of around 6,000 migrants, most of them from Central America and Venezuela, as it passed the main immigration inspection point in Chiapas state, near the border Guatemala.
López Obrador minimized the caravan on Thursday, assuring that it had already shrunk to about 1,582 people after some migrants decided to separate from the group. But activist Luis García, coordinator of the local organization Center for Human Dignification, which runs the group, disputed that information, telling the AP that about 7,000 people were still marching, about half of whom were minors.
Mexico has so far allowed these types of caravans in the hope that they will get tired of walking on the highway.
But letting them tire of forcing Venezuelans and other migrants to walk through the dangerous jungles of Panama's Darien Gap or removing migrants from passenger buses in Mexico no longer works.
“The journey is not easy. “We hope that the Mexican government will help us get the permit we need to work in Mexico City because we don't even have enough food,” said Ecuadorian Javier Añasco while speaking with the group of migrants headed to the southern city of Mapastepec.
Añasco admitted that his wife and three children, whom he left behind in Ecuador under precarious economic conditions, were his greatest motivation for moving forward. “We want the Mexican president to help us and show solidarity with us because we are not harming anyone,” he added.
CLOSURE OF RAILWAY CROSSINGS IN TEXAS
The number of migrants boarding freight trains to cross Mexico is so large that one of the country's two largest railway companies was forced to suspend service in September for safety reasons.
The closure of railroad crossings in Texas disrupts transportation from Mexico to the United States as well as the transfer of grain needed to feed livestock in Mexico.
López Obrador has expressed his willingness to help, but wants the US to send more development aid to the migrants' countries of origin, reduce or lift sanctions against Cuba and Venezuela and start a dialogue with the government in Havana.