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By Lizbeth Diaz
TIJUANA, MEXICO (Reuters) – Unaccompanied minors and other vulnerable migrants are at risk of crime in the border town of Tijuana, Mexico, where thousands of Central Americans are living in remote areas. Caravans could be stuck for months as authorities tighten the rules on asylum, according to the lawyers.
Some 4,600 stranded caravan migrants whose progress has angered US President Donald Trump are camping with blankets and some food in an overcrowded Tijuana stadium, whose mayor has declared a "humanitarian crisis."
Trump sent troops to the US-Mexico border, authorized the use of lethal force and threatened to close the border completely if migrant caravans were not stopped.
Among Central Americans, many of whom are Hondurans fleeing violence and poverty in the troubled region, there are about 80 minors aged between 10 and 17, according to migrant rights groups.
Joshua, a 15-year-old Honduran in Tijuana, said he was kidnapped and severely beaten in Mexico by drug traffickers claiming to belong to the infamous Zetas gang, during a previous attempt to visit the United States.
"I ended up in the hospital, I do not know how, because I got there half dead," he said, refusing to give his second name.
Once he has recovered, the authorities have deported him, he said.
Reuters has not been able to independently corroborate the details of its history. The Mexican Immigration Institute did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the case.
The Mexican think tank Seguridad Justicia y Paz ranked Tijuana as the fifth most violent city in the world in 2017, with a higher murder rate than the cities of Central America where migrants escape .
Juan Manuel Gastelum, Mayor of Tijuana, said on Thursday that the city was facing a humanitarian crisis and that migrant support cost more than 500,000 pesos ($ 25,000) a day. He urged international agencies to help Tijuana.
LIST OF WAITING
Activists fear that the Central Americans will be stuck in the city for a long time, when protests against the presence of the caravan have erupted.
In May, citing a lack of processing space at the same crossing, US immigration officials blocked an old caravan that had also attracted Trump's anger. Eventually, they started letting in a small group of people from the group.
To manage the flows of asylum seekers, the Mexican and American authorities have maintained a waiting list in recent years. Advocates and the human rights group Amnesty International said such measures slowed down the process.
US Customs and Border Protection officials said in a statement sent to Reuters that the port of entry of San Ysidro, which connects Tijuana to San Diego, California, could handle up to 100 people by day and that he was working with Mexico to manage the flow.
The National Institute of Immigration of Mexico stated that it protected the rights of all foreigners and was "respectful of the immigration policy implemented by other countries ".
Waiting for days, migrants from the caravan have registered on the waiting list. They include gay and transgender teens.
Erika Pinheiro, Litigation Director at Al Otro Lado, an immigration advocacy group, told a sworn California court that "LGBT children can not stay safe in Mexico. persecution".
Tijuana has only one migrant children's shelter, which survives with the help of civic organizations.
"Young people are certainly the most vulnerable in this type of movement," said Mynor Contreras, who heads the local YMCA. "We have never received so much so quickly."
If children can not enter the United States, they may be expelled from Mexico. This can cause big problems.
"I do not want to die," said Justin, 16, who recounted how his life was threatened last month for not paying the "war tax" that gangsters had charged for his small business of occasional clothes in the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula. "That day, I told my mother to give me her blessing and I left," he says crying.
(Report by Lizbeth Diaz, additional report by Delphine Schrank and Michael O & # 39; Boyle in Mexico City and Kristina Cooke in San Francisco, edited by Dave Graham & Rosalba O & # 39; Brien)
