Mexico’s northern border reflects new humanitarian crisis what the country is experiencing in the face of a new migration wave that has brought freight trains to a standstill due to migrant accidents, protests and clashes between foreigners and Mexican and American authorities.

The problem focuses mainly on metropolitan area of ​​Juarez and El Pasoin the US state of Texas, where the camp is located 500 migrants on the other side of the Rio Grande.

This has also resulted in the loss of millions of dollars in stranded shipments due to low customs throughput, while mass arrival of more migrants immigrants from Central America and the Caribbean, among them there is a growing belief that achieving the “American Dream” has become easier.

On Friday, following a meeting between three levels of Mexico’s government, immigration and municipal police vehicles drove through the Rio Grande where migrants gather, picking up those who have not presented legal permission to prove they are in the country.

He Mexican government has no rating about how many migrants are at the border of Ciudad Juarez, because hundreds of them arrive without registration every day and it is unknown how many manage to enter the United States.

Activists say shelters are at maximum capacity, with nearly 2,400 people waiting to see immigration authorities to be cleared, and more than 5,000 living in rented homes, abandoned buildings and on the streets.

Yvonne López de Lara, human rights coordinator at Casa del Migrante, one of the shelters hosting people on the move, said there is always talk of a humanitarian crisis “because we are not prepared to accept so many migrants at this border.” (northern Mexico).”

“The three levels (of government) should come up with a program or reform that limits situations like this because it harms the people of Ciudad Juarez since they cannot control and/or organize migrants. They come from their places of origin out of necessity, not pleasure.“added the activist.

The average number of encounters with people crossing the U.S. border illegally increased 31% in September to an average of 1,071, or 23,500 this month, according to the Border Patrol.

In August, this figure was 25,236 cases. or an average of 814 per day.

Francisco Garduño Yáñez, commissioner of the National Institute of Migration (INM), blamed the US government for the crisis that has already affected the economic and social part of this border.

“The problem is not us, the problem is in the United States (…) in the US embassy and consulate in two years there will be appointments, this is a bureaucracy worse than an elephant,” he said on Friday in Ciudad Juarez.

The business sector expressed concern as more than $500 million in cargo that could not be exported accumulated in a week.

On Friday night alone, there was still a line of at least 5 miles of loaded trailers spending the night near the Zaragoza-Isleta international crossing to cross into El Paso, Texas.

“I think we need to work on other types of schemes (…) if you ask the authorities how many people are here, we don’t know. This is a big problem both for them (migrants) and for us, for the people. because we don’t even know how to help them“Said Tor Salayandia Lara, National Vice President of Maquiladora and Borderlands of the National Chamber of Processing Industries.

The industry leader questioned authorities because they had allowed the problem to escalate to the point where the competitiveness of Ciudad Juarez and the entire border strip that relies on foreign trade was beginning to deteriorate.

Like Luis Alfredo Torres, many migrants They arrive in the border city of Juarez in northern Mexico. It took him a month and a half to travel from Venezuela to Juarez with his wife and son.

He explained that among his reasons is the salary of 20 dollars that grandparents who remain in the country of origin receive today, which, as he assured, is “not enough at all.”

“It’s either food or rent, work from 6 a.m. and arrive at 11 for $10“, he said.

Torres and his family know they can’t cross the fences set up on the U.S. side of the Rio Grande in Texas, but they’ve been warned that “you’ll have to survive here for days, with no food and no children.”

EFE