The Mexican authorities confirmed on Tuesday afternoon the nationality of several of the victims of the fire in a migrant detention center in Mexico’s Ciudad Juárez (on the border with the United States).
The Mexican Attorney General’s Office, citing the INM, reported that “identified migrants” are 28 Guatemalans, 13 Hondurans, 12 Venezuelans, 12 Salvadorans, one Colombian and one Ecuadorian, without differentiating between dead and injured.
The injured, some of them in serious condition, were taken to four hospitals, according to authorities.
The incident broke out on Monday night at the facilities of the National Institute of Migration (INM) in this city in the state of Chihuahua, when there were 68 men inside, all of them of legal age from Central and South America.
“After the unfortunate events that occurred in the Ciudad Juárez immigration station, where 39 people died and 29 more are seriously ill,” the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) said in a statement.
“Communication and coordination was established with consular authorities from different countries to implement actions that allow the full identification of deceased migrants,” the INM indicated.
(You can read: President of Mexico says that his country is “safer” than the United States)
The versions of the fire
The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, detailed earlier that the incident occurred at 9:30 p.m. local time on Monday (04:30 GMT on Tuesday) in Ciudad Juárez, on the border with the US city of El Paso, Texas, where he first there was an initial balance of 37 deaths, most of them from Central America and Venezuela.
López Obrador blamed a migrant protest for the fire. “This had to do with a protest that they started, from, we suppose, that they found out that they were going to be deported, mobilized, and as a protest, they put mats at the door of the shelter and set them on fire,” he declared.
The president “informed that the accident occurred because of a protest and that the director of the INM (Francisco Garduño) and the FGR (Attorney General’s Office) are already investigating to determine the responsibilities.”
(Also: Mexico finds 343 abandoned migrants; 103 are unaccompanied minors)
Ciudad Juárez, a neighbor of El Paso, Texas, is one of the border towns where many migrants remain stranded seeking to cross into the United States to seek refuge.
The presence of migrants in the area has intensified this year since the United States announced new measures, including the immediate deportation of migrants from Haiti, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba who arrive by land under Title 42.
The Mexican government has also faced criticism from human rights organizations for accepting US policies and deploying more than 20,000 elements of the Armed Forces at the borders for immigration tasks.
(More news: A Colombian dead and 4 injured in a bus carrying migrants in Mexico)
According to Mexican civil organizations, 2022 was the most tragic year for migrants in Mexico, because some 900 died in the attempt to cross without documents from the country to the United States.
The region is experiencing a record migratory flow, with 2.76 million undocumented immigrants detained at the United States border with Mexico in fiscal year 2022.
international reaction
The Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, was “deeply saddened” on Tuesday by the death of the migrants in the fire and called for a thorough investigation into what happened.
In a brief statement transmitted by Guterres’ spokesman, the Portuguese diplomat also offered his condolences to the families and loved ones of the deceased.
It is a reminder to the governments of the region of the importance of fixing a broken migration system.
In addition, the spokesman for the Secretary General, Stéphane Dujarric, insisted on the United Nations commitment to work with the authorities of the countries where movements of migratory people take place “to establish safer, more regulated and organized routes.”
For his part, the US ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, said Tuesday that the fire is a “reminder” of “the risks of irregular migration.”
“It is a reminder to the governments of the region of the importance of fixing a broken migration system and the risks of irregular migration,” Salazar said on his social networks.
ANGIE RUIZ
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With information from AFP and EFE
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