Page 12 - aruba-today-20190425

A12 WORLD NEWS
Thursday 25 april 2019

In Mexico, migrants turn to ‘The Beast’ after highway raids

By MARK STEVENSON still risky, way to reach the tion. Truckers, warned by mediately have to switch his companions could do
SONIA PEREZ D. U.S. border. the government that they from visibility to invisibility, nothing to help the man;
Associated Press “They’re riding the train could face fines, no longer and that can make them the train was moving too
IXTEPEC, Mexico (AP) — The again, that’s a fact,” said give rides to the migrants as more vulnerable and more fast to jump off. “He’s still
train known as “The Beast” back there somewhere,”
is once again rumbling Funes said. But he remains
through the night loaded undeterred. “We’re going
with people headed to- to rely on the train, despite
ward the U.S. border after everything we know that
a raid on a migrant cara- can happen to us.”
van threatened to end Gomez and many others
the practice of massive were also driven to desper-
highway marches through ation by another change in
Mexico Mexican policy. Whereas
A long freight train loaded in late 2018 and early 2019
with about 300 to 400 mi- authorities were hand-
grants pulled out of the ing out humanitarian visas
southern city of Ixtepec and processing asylum
on Tuesday. They sat atop requests, they have now
rattling boxcars and clung largely stopped doing so,
precariously to ladders instead making migrants
alongside the clanking cou- wait weeks in the southern
plings. Most were young town of Mapastepec for
men, along with a few doz- visas that never seem to
en woman and children. come. Gomez said “They
Mothers clambered up the lied to us, they made us
railings clutching their in- spend a month at the shel-
fants. Migrants displayed Central American migrants ride atop a freight train during their journey toward the U.S.-Mexico ter, they told us they were
a Honduran flag from atop border, in Ixtepec, Oaxaca State, Mexico, Tuesday, April 23, 2019. going to give up papers
the train. Associated Press but they never did.”
The train known in Span- Enrique Valiente, a 19-year-
ish as “La Bestia,” which Solalinde, who shelter now they did last year. Migrants at risk.” It’s not as if the mi- old roofer from El Salvador
runs from the southern bor- houses about 300 train-rid- are pulled off buses, and grants think the train is safe; who came to the U.S. at
der state of Chiapas into ing migrants. “It’s going to rounded up off the sides of they acknowledge the 3, spent much of his life in
neighboring Oaxaca and go back to the way it was, highways when they stop dangers of riding through Nevada and was deport-
north into Gulf coast state the (Mexican) government to rest. the darkness perched high ed last May after a traffic
Veracruz, carried migrants doesn’t want them to be “Now we’re going by train atop the freight cars. Just stop. He said Mexico had
north for decades, despite seen. If the migrants move because we can’t go on like increased U.S. border flatly refused to consider
its notorious dangers: Peo- quietly like a stream of lit- buses, because they won’t protection, Mexico’s in- him for asylum. He is afraid
ple died or lost limbs falling tle ants, they’ll allow them let us through,” said Rudi creased enforcement ef- to return to his native coun-
from the train. Mexican au- to, but they are not go- Margarita Montoya, the forts push migrants into us- try — which he knows little
thorities started raiding the ing to allow them to move wife of a Honduran car- ing more dangerous means about and where he has
trains to pull migrants off through Mexico publicly or penter, who was perched of travel. almost no remaining rela-
in mid-2014 and the num- massively” as they did with atop a freight car with her Carlos Marroquín, a me- tives — because he isn’t
ber of Central Americans the large caravans that young son and daughter chanic from El Salvador, familiar with complex rules
aboard the train fell to a began in October. In fact, and her husband. and his wife Brenda Gó- of getting along with street
smattering. Solalinde predicts “they’re Abbdel Camargo, a spe- mez, 24, clambered onto gangs in El Salvador, and
But about a week ago, a not going to allow cara- cialist on migration at the the train with their son, 5 could fall afoul of them.
longtime migrant rights ac- vans anymore.” College of the Southern and daughter, 10. Marro- He doesn’t even plan to
tivist, the Rev. Alejandro So- In Monday’s raid, federal Border, said the Mexican quin ticked off the dangers sneak back into the United
lalinde, noticed a change: police and agents de- government, under pres- facing them on the rails: States; his dream is to use
Large numbers of migrants tained 371 people, wres- sure from Washington, ap- “There are drug traffickers, his perfect English to find
started getting off the train tling men, women and chil- pears to be employing a gangs, thieves, but we’re work at a call center in the
in Ixtepec, the Oaxaca dren into patrol trucks and strategy of containing mi- putting everything into this, border city of Tijuana. But
town where his Brothers on vans and hauling them grants at certain points, because it means every- he can’t do that without
the Road shelter is located. off, presumably to begin dividing large groups, de- thing.” papers. The train was pop-
Many had waited weeks deportation proceedings. porting people in certain “If we can’t walk, if we ular for years, back when
for Mexican visas that nev- Many other migrants aban- circumstances and wear- can’t take the bus, we’ll “caravan” just meant small
er materialized, and sim- doned the road and fled ing migrants down with go on the train,” Marroquin Holy Week demonstrations
ply decided to head north into the surrounding coun- long waits for work visas. said. by migrants on the Guate-
without papers. Others tryside. Mexican authorities are Denis Funes, a migrant mala-Mexico border. Now,
were part of a 3,000-person The decision to turn to “The “holding them back at from central Honduras the train is popular once
migrant caravan that was Beast” derives from several specific points to turn the whose sun-beaten skin and again. Solalinde compared
broken up in a raid Mon- reasons, all related to the south of the country into a leathery hands betray his it to trying to squeeze off a
day by federal police and crackdown. retaining wall,” Camargo past as a farmworker, says leaky garden hose: Wher-
immigration agents on a With throngs of police pick- said. And while migrants he saw a fellow Hondu- ever Mexican authorities
highway east of Ixtepec. ups and small immigration have resorted to caravans ran knocked off the train crackdown, the migrants
With dozens of police and vans parked at checkpoints seeking safety in numbers, the previous night by a find an alternate route.
immigration checkpoints up and down the narrow he said that following Mon- low-hanging branch that “Nobody is ever going to
dotting the highways, waist of southern Mexico, day’s raid many migrants caught the man in the face be able to stop the flow
many migrants now view hitchhiking, taking buses or will surely change their and sent him hurtling to the of migration,” Solalinde
the train as a safer, albeit walking is no longer an op- strategies: “They will im- tracks below. Funes and said.q