US expels thousands of Haitians from Texas with no way to seek asylum

The United States began sending Haitians who had camped in a Texas border town home, while blocking those who wanted to cross the border into Mexico. Great show of force started what could be one of the biggest and fastest deportations of migrants and refugees for decades.

More 320 migrants they arrived on sunday to Port-au-Prince in three flights, and Haiti said it expected six more flights on Tuesday. In total, US authorities planned to deport many of the over 12,000 people camped around a bridge in Del Rio, Texas after crossing from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico.

The United States plans to organize seven daily flights expulsion as of Wednesday, four in Port-au-Prince and three in Cap-Haitien, according to an American official who was not authorized to comment publicly on the case. Flights will continue to depart from San Antonio, although authorities may add another route from El Paso, he added.

Antecedents

The only obvious example of mass deportation without the possibility of seeking asylum has been in 1992when the coast guard intercepted Haitian refugees at sea, said Yael Shacher, an American activist with Refugees International, who based her doctoral studies on the history of asylum in the United States.

During the years of peak immigration, many groups of Mexicans were deported, but transfers were made by land and not so suddenly.

Migrants from Central America have also crossed the border in similar contingents without facing mass deportations, although Mexico has agreed to receive them from the United States under a mandate associated with the pandemic introduced. in March 2020.

Mexico does not accept deported Haitians nor to persons of other nationalities, with the exception of Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans and Salvadorans.

When the border closed on Sunday, immigrants first found other paths to cross around the area, until they find federal and state agents.

An Associated Press reporter saw Haitian migrants continue to cross the river to the United States about 1.5 miles east of the previous crossing point, but they were finally arrested by officers on horseback from the Texas Border Patrol and Security Forces.

Some Haitians they crossed the river with boxes on their heads full of food. Several took off their pants before entering the river and held them out of the water. Others didn’t seem worried about getting wet.

Officers shouted at the migrants, in waist-deep water, and told them to get out of the water. The hundreds of people who had made it through and were waiting on the American side They were ordered to go to the Del Rio camp. Mexican agents on a boat told others they wanted to cross over to return to Mexico.

Charlie Jean had returned from the camps in Ciudad Acuña to look for food for his wife and three daughters, aged 2, 5 and 12. I was waiting on the Mexican side a restaurant will deliver an order rice.

“We need food every day. I can do without it, but my daughters cannot,” Jean said, who lived in Chile for five years before embarking on the journey north to the United States. It was not known whether he had been able to cross the river again and reach the camp.

Mexico also deports

Mexico announced on Sunday that I would also start to expel Haitians to your country. An official noted that the flights would depart from Monterrey, near the border with the United States, and Tapachula, on the border with Guatemala, where the largest group of migrants is located.

In recent years, large numbers of Haitians have emigrated to the United States from South America. Many of them left their Caribbean countries after a devastating earthquake in 2010.

When the jobs associated with the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro ran out, many embarked on the dangerous journey to the United States border on foot, by bus, and by car, which included traversing the dreaded jungle. from Darien to Panama.

Some migrants from Del Rio camp said another recent earthquake in Haiti and the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse made them fearful of returning to a country that appears more unstable that when they left.

“In Haiti there is no security”Said Fabricio Jean, a 38-year-old Haitian who came to Texas with his wife and two daughters. “The country is in a political crisis.

Several Haitians who had managed to reach the North American coast returned by the same road to the Mexican side so as not to be deported to their country.

Associated Press

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