In addition to low-income migrants, Mexico’s border with the United States receives more and more professionals from South America who seek to cross at all costs due to the economic situation and violence in their countries, as shown by testimonies collected by EFE.
An example of this, in Ciudad Juárez, is the Colombian businesswoman Yésica Bordae, who closed her company due to a change in regulation and, when she still had financial resources, tried to get a visa to go to the United States, but they denied it, so who embarked on the irregular migratory route.
“I asked for my visa and they denied it. For what reason? I don’t know, because I had all the documentation up to date, company banking documents, at that time I had the possibility of paying for a visa and they denied it because they wanted to, they didn’t agree with me,” said the woman, who after spending three years in Spain arrived in Juárez with his daughter.
On the border between Juárez and El Paso, it crossed the barbed wire that Texas Governor Gregg Abott placed last year and reached the wall, but the Texas National Guard returned it through the same hole through which it entered.
“They literally took me out by force. They took me out with the girl, they didn’t care that the girl was hungry, that the girl was sick from the heat, because the girl vomited. They took me out from the same side where I went in,” the woman said. .
The greater the migration and the more restrictions
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) highlighted this Friday the record of irregular migration in Mexico in 2023, with more than 782,000 undocumented immigrants detected, although it observed a decrease in the flow on the border with the United States in January of this year.
Given these figures, immigration controls have increased on the border between Mexico and Texas, where the governor has raised the barricade, deployed the National Guard and refuses to remove the barbed wire despite a ruling by the United States Supreme Court. Joined.
“The Texas Guard took us out, I was already there at the wall. Three armed men took me out, they were the ones who took me out of there,” Bordae said.
The businesswoman also seeks to avoid the arrest of agents of the Mexican Migration Institute (INM).
“I came here for a better future for my daughter but I honestly didn’t think it would be that hard. I didn’t know that I was militarized, that’s why I made the decision to come. “I was hurt by the barbed wire, I’m hurt everywhere,” she said.
The woman assured that she migrated because the Colombian Government’s policies affect the companies.
“I had a social security company, but the president (Gustavo Petro) put an end to that, right now he does not allow third parties to pay people’s social security but it has to be from a company directly, he put an end to everything, he has put an end to many things,” he said.
Expelled by violence
Alonso Ramírez Torres is a dentist who came to Juárez from Lima, Peru, where he fled extortion.
His wife and one of his children entered, but the second of his children got stuck and the family is now divided by the border.
“I am a dentist and I had extortion problems in my country. Unfortunately, the authorities in my country do nothing more than receive your complaint and leave you to fate,” said the dentist.
He said that he suffered threats from criminals who came to his house, shot at his car, stole things and the only option he had was to sell what he had and leave the country with his entire family.
“Throughout the entire trip things have been the worst for us, they have robbed us. Here in Mexico, I can say that there is no authority that defends the rights of the people who support us,” he said.
“It is the same police that hand us over to the cartels, it is the same (people from the National Institute of) Migration that hand us over and we suffer,” he added while walking on the side of the Rio Grande.
_____________________
We invite you to visit us on the new NY1 Noticias channel on WhatsApp. There you will find the most relevant news about what is happening in New York, as well as other coverage about the rest of the country, Latin America and the world. click in this link to access the channel. We thank you in advance if you become one of our followers and express your reaction to what we publish with an emoji.
