Illness, fear, harassment in Mexico wither in the caravan
Illness, fear, harassment in Mexico wither in the caravan
Little by little, the disease, fear and harassment of the police are reducing the caravan of migrants heading to the United States border, with many of the 4,000 to 5,000 immigrants camped overnight under a plastic sheet in a city in the south of the country. Mexico complain of exhaustion.
The group, many of them with children and even pushing small children in strollers, planned to leave Mapastepec at dawn on Thursday with more than 1,000 miles to travel before reaching the United States border.
But in recent days, a few hundred have accepted government offers to take them back to their countries of origin.
José David Sarmientos Aguilar, a 16-year-old student from San Pedro Sula, Honduras, was one of at least 80 immigrants waiting in the town square of Huixtla, where the rest of the caravan departed on Wednesday morning, for four buses They would take Back to Honduras.
Sarmientos Aguilar said that it was partly the spontaneous nature of the caravan (many people joined without thinking), as well as the rumors about the death of the migrants who made it enter.
He joined the march "without thinking about what could happen and the consequences it could bring," he said. He said the death of a migrant who fell from a truck on Monday and the vague rumors of two migrants killed in Huixtla also pushed him to return.
"There have been many tragedies, it is not necessary to continue losing more lives to get there (USA)," he said. "I'm a little sick in the chest, I have a cough, and so, instead of running the risk of getting sick and something happens to me, it's better to go home."
Carlos Roberto Hernández, from the province of Yoro in Honduras, has a hoarse cough. For him, it was the scorching heat during the day and the rains of the night that led him to leave.
"The rain hit us, and since then I have had a cold," said Hernández. When asked if he would make another attempt to reach the United States, he said emphatically: "No. I'm going to make my life in Honduras."
For Pedro Arturo Torres, it seemed to be the nostalgia that broke his determination to reach the United States.
"We did not know what awaited us," Torres said. "We want to return to our country, where you can survive, even if only with beans, but you can survive, there with our families, in peace."
The attitude of the Mexican federal government has also played a role in the wear and tear of the caravan.
All the food, old clothes, water and medicine given to migrants come from private citizens, church groups or comprehensive local officials.
The federal government has not given migrants on the road a single meal, a bath or a bottle of water. He has reserved these basic considerations only for migrants who surrender to immigration Offices to request visas or be deported. Authorities say that almost 1,700 migrants have already abandoned and sought asylum in Mexico.
Sometimes the federal police has interfered with the caravan.
In at least one case, The Associated Press saw federal police officers force half a dozen passenger vans to stop and have the drivers fire the migrants, leaving Mexican passengers on board. In a climate where the heat makes it almost impossible to walk at noon, these tactics can affect the health of migrants.
In Mapastepec, where the main group stayed on Wednesday night, it seemed that the size of the caravan had decreased slightly. The United Nations estimated earlier this week that approximately 7,000 people were in the group. The Mexican government gave its own figure on Wednesday of "approximately 3,630."
Parents say they are moving ahead with their children's future, and fears of what might happen to them at home in a gang-dominated Honduras, which was the main motivation for deciding to leave first.
"They can not be alone ... There is always danger," said Ludin Girón, a Honduran street vendor who makes the difficult journey with his three young children. "When (members of a gang) see a pretty girl, they want it for themselves, if they see a child, they want him to take drugs."
Rejecting any of the demands can be deadly. Honduras has a homicide rate of approximately 43 per 100,000 inhabitants, one of the highest in the world for any country that is not in open war.
On Wednesday, Giron huddled with his children, Justin, Nicole, 3, and Astrid, 5, in the seat of a motorcycle taxi meant for only two passengers. Also perched on the dangerous overcrowded motorcycle were Reyna Esperanza Espinosa and her 11-year-old daughter, Elsa Araceli.
Espinosa, a tortilla maker from Cortés, Honduras, said there was no work at home. "That's why we decided to come here to give our children a better future," he said.
Such caravans have taken place regularly, albeit on a smaller scale, over the years, but the president of the United States, Donald Trump, has taken advantage of the phenomenon this year and has turned it into a call for his Republican base before the mid-term elections on November 6.
Trump has blamed the Democrats for what he says are weak immigration laws, and claimed that gang members of the MS-13 and unknown "Middle Eastern" hid among the migrants. He later acknowledged that there was "no proof" of the claim that the inhabitants of the Middle East were in the crowd. But he tweeted on Wednesday that the United States "will never accept the people who enter our country illegally!"
Associated Press journalists who travel with the caravan have met with crowds of Hondurans, as well as Guatemalans, Salvadorans and Nicaraguans, but no one from the Middle East. Many were young people traveling with their families. Time and again, they cited poverty and violence in their countries as reasons to leave.
Another caravan, smaller, earlier this year, decreased greatly as it passed through Mexico, with only 200 arriving at the California border. Those who manage to enter the United States face difficulties to be allowed to stay. The United States authorities do not consider poverty, which many cite as a reason to migrate, in the processing of asylum applications.
Carmen Mejía, from Copán, Honduras, held the 3-year-old Sofia Alvarado in her arms and grabbed the hand of Miralia Alejandra Alvarado, 7, also sweaty and feverish.
Mejía said she was exhausted. Even so, she promised to continue. "I've come a long way, I do not want to go back, I want a better future for my children."
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