A new caravan left this border city with Guatemala, in the framework of the International Migrants Day, seeking to advance to the center and north of Mexico, as well as to make visible the humanitarian crisis suffered by undocumented immigrants, said activist Luis García Villagrán, from the Center for Human Dignity A.C.
The exodus made up of some 1,500 people began the walk in the first minutes of this Wednesday towards the coastal highway of Chiapas where they walked for about six hours until reaching the municipality of Huehuetán to take their first break.
“There has been a crisis that has worsened for seven years, we have a human knot that they want to make in this city and that is why the contingents, that is why the so-called caravans, the exoduses, this is an exodus for peace that is trying to make visible the serious problem that we have with human mobility,” said García Villagrán.
According to his estimates, around one million migrants have crossed the border with Guatemala in search of the American dream, and the flow will continue despite threats from the president-elect of the United States, Donald Trump.
“Human mobility will not cease, people will not stop walking, moving towards the United States or wherever they have to go, regardless of who is the President. The problem here is that there is no civilized agreement between the parties, between the government of Claudia Sheinbaum and the government of the United States,” added the defender.
Venezuelan Rubí Vázquez said that being a migrant is one of the worst conditions for a human being because they have to leave their family and place of origin in search of a better life.
“One really does not want to leave their country, leave their mother, their father, their children, it is not easy to leave that. To sleep in squares, on the streets, to ask for food when you have a home, and we are forced to leave our country, it is not because we want to,” she commented.
He said that the level of vulnerability is very high, being victims of crime and xenophobia of the people through which they advance on their route to the north.
Jesus Tovar, from Venezuela, said that at 56 years of age he still has the strength to work and by migrating he preferred to risk his life rather than expose those of his children and grandchildren.
“The salary is not enough for food or clothing, I have my children, I have grandchildren, and I prefer to come myself than for them to come for safety, because I went through (the Jungle) the Darien, I have gone through all these countries and my path is to reach the United States, but if I do well in Mexico, they are waiting for me to work, I will stay,” said the South American.
This is the ninth migrant caravan leaving Chiapas, and the sixth since Trump’s victory. Migrants agree that they are leaving the southern border of Mexico due to the lack of jobs and the delay in regularization procedures, but mainly because they want to arrive before the Republican takes office in the White House next January.
Source: jornada
