Mexico would have defeated two migrant caravans, activists say

(Tapachula) Mexican immigration authorities have broken up two migrant caravans heading toward the U.S. border, activists said Saturday.

Some migrants were bused to cities in southern Mexico, others were offered transit papers.

It all took place a week after US President-elect Donald Trump threatened to impose 25% tariffs on Mexican products if the country did not do more to stem the flow of migrants at the US border.

On Wednesday, Trump said Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum had agreed to end illegal migration across the border into the United States. M^me Sheinbaum wrote on his social media accounts the same day that “migrants and caravans are taken care of before they reach the border.”

Migrant rights activist Luis García Villagrán said the dismantling of the two caravans appeared to be part of a “deal between the president of Mexico and the president of the United States.” The first caravan left from Tapachula, a town in southern Mexico near the border with Guatemala, on November 5, the day Mr. Trump was elected.

At the height of its march, it had around 2,500 people. In nearly four weeks of walking, the group had covered approximately 430 kilometers to Tehuantepec, in the state of Oaxaca.

In Tehuantepec, Mexican immigration officials offered weary migrants free bus rides to other cities in southern or central Mexico.

“They took some of us to Acapulco, others to Morelia and others from our group to Oaxaca,” said Bárbara Rodríguez, an opposition supporter who left her native Venezuela after the disputed presidential elections from this country earlier this year.

M^me Rodriguez said by phone that she then took a bus by herself to Mexico City.

In a statement released Saturday, the National Immigration Institute said the migrants had voluntarily accepted bus rides “to different areas where there is medical assistance and where their migration status will be examined.” The press release adds that “by accepting [les trajets]they said they no longer wanted to face the risks on their way.”

The second caravan, of around 1,500 migrants, left on November 20 and traveled approximately 225 kilometers to the town of Tonala, in Chiapas state. There, authorities offered a sort of transit visa that allows people to travel through Mexico for 20 days.

M^me Sheinbaum said she was confident a tariff war with the United States could be avoided. But his statement – ​​given the day after his phone call with Mr Trump – did not specify who had offered what.

Apart from the first, much larger caravans of 2018 and 2019, which benefited from buses to travel part of the way north, no caravan has been able to reach the US border on foot or by hitchhiking from coherently, even if some individual members succeeded.

For years, migrant caravans have often been blocked, harassed or prevented from hitchhiking by Mexican police and immigration officials. They were also frequently arrested or returned to areas near the Guatemalan border.