[ad_1]
Published
By Reuters
MAPASTEPEC, Mexico City / MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Thousands of Central Americans migrated to the United States, where President Donald Trump has declared them unwelcome and threatened to cut off their homes. countries.
Central American migrants, part of a second wave of migrants heading to the U.S., walk along a highway as they continue their journey to the Mexican border, in Zacapa, Guatemala October 24, 2018. REUTERS / Luis Echeverria / MANILA BULLETIN
Men, women and children, mostly from Honduras, had set their sights on the U.S. border, more than 1,100 miles (1,770 km) away. They started arriving in the town of Mapastepec, about 35 miles to the northwest, by the afternoon.
Their trek has drawn the ire of Trump, who has used the migrant caravan to fire up support for his countryan party ahead of Nov. 6 congressional elections.
It has prompted Washington to put pressure on the Mexican government to halt the migrants' progress.
The caravan, which began as a few hundred people of the crime-wrought Honduran city of San Pedro Sula on Oct. 13, has been joined by migrants from El Salvador, Nicaragua and Guatemala.
Mexican immigration authorities have said they will not be able to cross illegally into the United States, but private citizens have offered them supplies and rides.
Alex Mensing of Pueblo Sin Fronteras, a group that organized a previous migrant caravan that angered Trump in April, said on Wednesday the current caravan included about 10,000 people.
Pueblo Sin Fronteras is accompanying the caravan, which Mensing forecast would fragment in due course.
"It's very unlikely that 10,000 people will arrive together at a border city between Mexico and the United States," he told a conference call with reporters.
"There will be people who will stay in Mexico, where will they go?"
In Huixtla, residents and religious groups, donated clothes, and local authorities provided vaccines, water and food.
"The people of Mexico have given us much more than we expected," said Honduran migrant activist Argelia Ramirez, one of a shifting group of de facto speakers for the caravan.
Neris Wong, who had walked to her native Honduras, covered her face as a medical worker at Mapastepec's town square blistered on her foot.
"I walked so much that I hurt myself. I do not have the right shoes for walking, "Wong said.
Migrants trekking north defy tropical heat, Trump threats
Mexican authorities have tried to close their borders while respecting migrants' rights.
About 4,500 people reached Huixtla, around 30 miles north of the Guatemalan border. Reuters could not independently verify how many people had assembled in Huixtla.
The migrants camped out in the open on Tuesday night under the roofs of the road.
A separate group of at least 1,000 migrants, also mostly Hondurans, has been moving slowly through Guatemala toward Mexico. Some media put the number above 2,000.
[ad_2]
Source link
