Mexico City, Aug 23 : A new caravan headed for the United States with approximately 500 people from Central and South American countries has set off from Mexico’s southernmost state of Chiapas local media reported.The caravan left this morning Miguel Hidalgo Central Park in the city of Tapachula close to the border with Guatemala where a lot of migrants have been left for days waiting for documents required to legally move through Mexico towards the northern border with the US to be processed, as reported by Xinhua news agency.
The caravan travelled through an immigration checkpoint around 6 km to the north of Tapachula without incident or confrontations with immigration authorities, local media reported.
The migrants are planning to trek for around 300 km within the next couple of days to arrive at San Pedro Tapanatepec in Oaxaca state in southern Mexico and are hoping to obtain documents for travel faster as in Tapachula.
A number of caravans of migrants set off from Tapachula in the last few months, and all through 2021, although the majority were disbanded after being dismantled by Mexican authorities, as per local news reports.
Some migrants have accepted jobs in regions with less immigration flows than Chiapas where migrants come continuously predominantly from Central and South America.
The largest caravan to date this year was a departure from Tapachula on the 6th of June with over 10,000 people but was disbanded just five days later following signing an agreement with immigration officials.
The increase in caravans of migrants has highlighted the massive immigration crisis that has afflicted Central America and Mexico’s border cities in recent years.
Mexico has deported over 114,000 illegal immigrants in 2021 and held between January 1 and 13 April of this year according to the Immigration Policy Unit of the Ministry of the Interior.
The total number of people detained by US at the border with Mexico between October 1st, 2020 through September 30, 2021 amounted to 1,734,686, an all-time record.
