TAPACHULA – On the eve of a visit by a US delegation to address the migration crisis, a caravan of more than ten thousand migrants left the southern border of Mexico on Sunday in the middle of Christmas Eve to put pressure on the two governments.
Thousands of migrants of 24 nationalities walked from the border city of Tapachula, in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, early Sunday and risked the walk to Álvaro Obregon, where they will spend a complicated Christmas.
This group of people, mostly children, women and entire families, walked along Federal Highway 200 and crossed the first checkpoint at Ejido Viva México, where they were watched only by members of the National Guard and the National Migration Institute (INM).
Civil Protection delegate, Julissa Esther Briones Magaña, confirmed to EFE that there are 10,000 people on the move, which is why she recommended to the migrant population to protect their health and the health of their children and at the same time asked drivers to drive with caution due to this mass exodus of people.
According to Luis Rey García Villagran, Director of the Center for Human Dignity (CDH), this caravan is the largest mass exodus this year and could exceed 15,000 people who will walk as many days as possible to reach Mexico City at your first point.
“There is a stopper and a human complex that is reflected in this group that we lead, we say to the Mexican state that it leaves us no choice but to go all the way to the INM and the finger of the President of the Republic Andrés Manuel López Obrador, say yes or no,” Villagran said: “Today we are the poorest of the poorest of those who “They are most in need, those of us who don’t have the money to pay for visas or visas.”
Venezuelan migrant Jesús Silva, traveling with his wife, said immigration agents in Ciudad Hidalgo checked him into a unit and took him to the Siglo 21 immigration center, where they obtained a document to leave Mexico.
“The real choice is to walk,” Silva said, “and I depend on the caravan, because it is the place where we feel safest with the Latin brothers who leave with a new dream, with hope for life.”
Honduran migrant José Wilmer Fernández Caballero, who received a positive decision from the Mexican Committee for Assistance to Refugees (COMAR), tried to leave Chiapas, but was told by immigration authorities that it was worthless and of no use.
“It was useless to spend so much time in Tapachula, wasting time, they always drop me off and bring me back, and here we have a positive decision, but they always drop me off (the bus) and tell me it's worthless,” he said.
This caravan traveled about four hours from Tapachula to Álvaro Obregon Ejido, where its members will spend Christmas under the trees and roofs and on the grass and floors, cardboard, mats and blankets that they carry so that they can spend this night that should be familiar, in peace and with much joy, but they made this journey In order to reach the United States.
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