MEXICO CITY—Tension intensified Monday at Mexico’s southern border with Guatemala as thousands of Central American migrants forded the shallow waters of the Suchiate River in an attempt to continue their march to the U.S.
Mexican security forces used tear gas to break up a group of about 2,000 migrants, most of them Hondurans fleeing poverty and violence, who attempted to enter Mexico after being denied access on Saturday and earlier Monday.
Later in the day, migrants threw bottles and rocks at National Guard officers. Some of them managed to breach the security cordon and ran into the Mexican border town of Ciudad Hidalgo. But most were contained on the Mexican side of the river and in the middle of the river, left bare by shallow waters. Others opted to return to shelters in the Guatemalan town of Tecún Umán, residents said.
A group with hundreds of migrants who managed to cross into Mexico and continued the journey on foot toward the U.S., some 1,200 miles away, was later detained by Mexican authorities.
“It’s been total chaos,” said Jeremías Estrada, a Mexican farmer who lives in Ciudad Hidalgo. “Most couldn’t cross into Mexico, but the National Guard had to work really hard.”
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More than 500 members of the newly created National Guard, which is under military command and was initially formed to tackle drug cartels, were sent in recent days to southern Mexico to contain the caravan that left from Honduras last week.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has sent mixed messages to the migrants. Last week, he offered them access to some 4,000 jobs in Mexico if they entered the country in a peaceful way and registered with immigration authorities. But on Sunday, Mexico’s immigration agency said that the majority of more than 1,000 migrants who had complied with the government’s instructions would be sent back to their home country. The government also said last week it wouldn’t allow the group to enter illegally.
Mr. López Obrador, who welcomed migrants to Mexico during his first few months in office, reversed course last year after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to slap Mexico with import tariffs. After U.S. and Mexican officials reached a deal on tougher immigration policies over the summer, Mr. López Obrador quickly became a close ally of the American president in his efforts to reduce illegal migration.
Since then, Mexican authorities haven’t allowed caravans to cross the country as thousands of Central American migrants did in 2018. Instead, Mr. Lopez Obrador deployed 20,000 National Guard members—almost a fourth of the force—to block migrants along Mexico’s southern and northern borders. Mexico also stepped up detentions and deportations and increased road checkpoints and migrant raids on hotels, trains, buses and safe houses.
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Since Mr. López Obrador’s abrupt about face, Mr. Trump has repeatedly praised the Mexican leader and said he personally likes him. But Mr. López Obrador has earned the criticism of human rights groups and social activists who say he has kowtowed to Mr. Trump by reversing campaign promises of help and humane treatment for migrants.
“López Obrador and Mexico have become Trump’s wall,” said Irineo Mujica, the head of advocacy group People Without Borders, who helped organize migrant caravans in the past. Mr. Mujica said he was “profoundly disappointed” with Mr. López Obrador’s migration policy. Last year, Mexico briefly arrested him on charges of human trafficking, but a judge dismissed the charges.
After taking office in December 2018, Mr. Lopez Obrador offered more than 13,000 humanitarian visas to Central American migrants to stay and work in Mexico. “My government is not in favor of the use of force to contain migration,” he said in early 2019.
In 2017, Mr. Lopez Obrador filed a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights denouncing Mr. Trump’s plans to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, and other anti-immigrant actions taken by the U.S. president.
Mr. López Obrador’s crackdown has been a key reason for the major drop in migrant apprehensions on the U.S. border, U.S. officials say. Detentions of migrants fell from 130,000 in May—the highest in 13 years—to some 32,800 in December. Meanwhile, Mexico’s detentions of Central Americans have risen 35% through November, compared with the previous year.
The latest caravan arrived at the Mexican-Guatemalan border on Friday. On Saturday, migrants tried to cross into Mexico through the international bridge, but were pushed back by National Guard members in a brief showdown.
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Mexican authorities tried unsuccessfully to persuade migrants that their chances to get asylum in the U.S. are grim. “Don’t be fooled. It is not true that the U.S. will give you asylum. On the contrary, you could be sent back immediately to Guatemala,” a recorded voice repeated time and time again from a speaker installed at the bridge.
Mr. Trump’s administration has sent nearly 60,000 mostly Central American migrants to Mexico in the last year while they wait for their asylum proceedings to be adjudicated in the U.S. The Trump administration has also recently signed several asylum deals with Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador to send asylum seekers from third countries to ask for protection there instead of in the U.S.
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