A migrant caravan that started the weekend in the state of Chiapas, bordering with Guatemala, advanced on Wednesday adding new members who seek to go to the center of the country, where they expect more support from authorities.
The thousands of people, mainly Central American women and children, left the municipality very early Huixtla, where they took the opportunity to communicate with relatives, rest or take a bath in a river and wash their clothes. New groups of migrants joined in that same area, according to Reuters witnesses.
“Sometimes there is work, sometimes there is no work, so we had to take courage to make the decision to climb up (to the United States). It was not easy,” he told Reuters Julio Gonzalez, a Honduran migrant who spent the night, along with his two sick children and his wife, on the street and in the rain.
Organizers of the caravan told Reuters that due to the number of children accompanying the mobilization, they would rest in Villa Comaltitlán, 17 kilometers from Huixtla, to resume their journey very early on Thursday. To get to Mexico City, their destination, still have to travel 1,000 kilometers.
“Thank God we have not had problems with migration, God is opening doors for us,” added González, who is part of the caravan that advances while the president of USA, Joe Biden, faces criticism of the high levels of migration, widespread violence and hunger in Central America.
Unlike other mobilizations, so far there have been no confrontations between security forces and migrants, according to testimonies given to Reuters. However, hundreds of migrants, mainly Haitians, preferred not to move forward for fear of being detained or deported, as has happened recently.
On Monday, two Haitian migrants were found dead in the city of Tapachula, where many are still awaiting a response to their request for refuge in Mexico. “It was something terrible, there must be justice” he said Wilner Metelus, President of the Citizen Committee in defense of the Naturalized and Afro-Mexicans (CCDNAM).
The Migration’s national institute (INM) later said in a statement that some families that were part of the mobilization voluntarily requested their return to Tapachula, from where the caravan left, so as not to expose children to the long journey.
Reference-www.eleconomista.com.mx