One of the most painful misfortunes of the migratory phenomenon is witnessing the treatment that many of these lives in transit have to suffer in order to survive and try to fulfill their dream, which is to cross into the United States. The hard thing about this is that for almost a decade now, the ways of migrating have changed and this has further complicated the risk situations to which thousands of people are exposed, including entire families, women, young people and above all. all children who suffer the most from the dangers of crime and are exposed to exploitation. A month ago, a month-old baby of Guatemalan nationality was abandoned by a coyote on the banks of the Colorado River, on the border between San Luis Río Colorado and Yuma, Arizona. The hard thing is that this reality happens every day, where hundreds of underage children who come from Central America and mainly from Guatemala and El Salvador, are left alone and to their fate, at the mercy of coyotes, criminals and dangers that the migrant journey of itself implies.
During the month of March alone, the migration authorities were able to rescue 103 unaccompanied minors, in a truck on the Cosamaloapan-La Tinaja highway. Thus, these children leave one hell to enter another, alone, and remain under the guardianship of the Integral Family Systems and refuge, to later be returned to their countries of origin.
Last month, the National Migration Commission announced that the migratory flow through the country would have suffered a considerable increase, hand in hand with the increase in refugee applications of children and adolescents, counting between 2021 and 2023, on 23 % by minors. The migration agenda in general and focused on the treatment of unaccompanied minor children should be a priority for the country, due to the state of vulnerability and risk that it implies. Only in fiscal year 2022, 2.76 million undocumented immigrants were detained at the border between the United States and Mexico, which implies, according to the International Organization for Migration, an increase of 8% compared to the previous year.
The migration of minors in transit through the country must and must be considered a priority on the national agenda, not only because of the levels of risk that these children and adolescents have to face alone on their way to the border, but also because being minors, we have a human co-responsibility for their protection, care and protection.
To get an idea of the size of the problem, during 2022, the INM reported the rescue of 747,000 migrants, of which approximately 110,000 were minors. Of this total, about 14,270 were alone, without guardians, parents, or someone to accompany them on the trip, and of these 6,000 were repatriated to their countries of origin. According to data from the Immigration Policy Unit, during the last five years, the United States has deported approximately 217,000 minors and between 2003 and 2021 around 400,000 unaccompanied minors sought asylum in the United States.
The migrant tragedy is experienced every day, but we must not get used to this becoming normal. Every life is worth, and it is our duty to insist before governments and institutions that the dignity and care of these lives, especially these children, makes us co-responsible for being on our soil. Every child has the right to laugh, to be educated, to be fed, but above all to dream and have a life as dignified and valuable as others. Let’s not turn the problem of migration into just a matter of bureaucratic management, percentages and numbers, let alone think of these children as data, they are lives that deserve by right to laugh, not be hungry, have an education, play spaces, but, above all, everything, hope and being able to dream of a life outside of an insecure and violent environment.
