WASHINGTON. Oct 1 (NNN-Prensa Latina) — A growing number of migrants stuck on the border with Mexico because of the policies of President Donald Trump are using riskier tactics to enter the United States, The New York Times warned Monday.
The newspaper noted that thousands of Central American migrants have been clustered in Mexican border cities like Matamoros for months, unable to seek asylum in the United States because of a series of increased restrictions imposed by the Trump administration.
According to the newspaper, a State Department travel warning shows that there are places where those waiting in Mexico face dangers such as kidnappings, murders and assaults, comparable to the situations that caused many to flee their home countries in the first place.
Their prospects of gaining access to US territory went from meager to nearly impossible earlier this month, when the Supreme Court enacted a new rule that prevents migrants who passed through a third country from seeking asylum here unless they have sought and been denied asylum in another nation, the media said.
According to the Times, some migrants have given up and taken free transportation provided by the US government and the UN back to their homes in Central America.
But many other migrants who remain trapped in Matamoros said desperation has led them to consider treacherous and potentially deadly border crossings across the river or travelling in hot, airless trucks driven by people smugglers.
According to the publication, this reflects an important change in the dynamics at the border, as during a period of 18 months, many of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who crossed the border from Mexico sought Border Patrol agents, rather than hiding from them, to seek asylum.
The new policies of the Trump administration have played a role in drastically reducing these numbers, but they also appear to be driving more people underground, the Times stressed.
The newspaper added that in just one day last week, in the city of Laredo, Texas, 111 people were arrested who were crowded into the back of three different trucks, one of which had an inside temperature of 40 degrees Celsius.
According to the Border Patrol, the number of migrants who have been caught hiding in tractors along the border rose by 40 percent this year.
On the Mexican side, the newspaper noted, smugglers have become the last hope for many migrants who fear waiting months while their asylum applications are processed in the United States, knowing that they are likely to be denied that request anyway. — NNN-PRENSA LATINA
