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A migrant caravan of close to 1,000 migrants, the seventh formed in southern Mexico in August alone, departed early Tuesday morning from Tapachula, on the border with Guatemala, because the National Institute of Migration refuses to issue temporary permits.
Seven caravans have left Tapachula in the last month to walk to San Pedro Tapanatepec, in the neighboring state of Oaxaca, where they hope to get permission to transit through Mexico to the US border.
The group of people organized and formed a new caravan in less than 24 hours. Most men from Venezuela, Ecuador, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Honduras, and other Central American countries are traveling, with about 150 children and hundreds of women.
José Gregorio Hernández, originally from Caracas, stated that their goal is to pass through Mexico in a peaceful, orderly, and well-behaved manner, which is why they are asking the Mexican authorities to allow them to transit.
“We are not asking for money, food, water. We are not that kind of people; we are educated, hardworking and honest people, not only from Venezuela but from many parts of the world,” he told EFE.
The South American migrant believed that the Mexican government contradicts itself because in San Pedro Tapanatepec, the authorities granted a safe-conduct to transit through the national territory. Still, from Tapachula to that place, they detain or return them.
Édgar Acuña, a Venezuelan paramedic, pointed out that their common goal is to reach the United States.
“The main goal will be to reach San Pedro and process the permit that will allow us to continue circulating, if the permit is not feasible we will continue to Piedras Niegras (in the state of Coahuila) or Nuevo Leon (in the north of Mexico) until we achieve the goal of reaching the United States,” he mentioned.
To strengthen the caravan, they could join other groups on the road to avoid being deported to Guatemala.
The caravans reflect a record migration flow to the US, whose Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has intercepted more than 1.7 million people in the fiscal year 2022, which began last October.
