US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken is set to visit Mexico City on Wednesday to discuss a recent surge in illegal immigration as migrant caravans are said to number in the thousands to the border.
Blinken, 61, will meet with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador along with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and White House homeland security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall.
Ahead of the meeting, Homeland Security officials have been debating how Mexico can help reduce numbers at the US southern border — including controlling the trains migrants use to travel north, moving migrants south, and providing incentives not to go to the border, CNN reported.
The rally comes as President Biden faces mounting pressure from both Republicans and his own party over the crisis on the US-Mexico border.
Earlier this month, the White House failed to secure billions of dollars in aid for Ukraine, Israel and the border when leaders could not agree on border policy changes, CNN reported
A migrant caravan of at least 8,000 people is heading to the US border. AP
Blinken’s trip to Mexico also coincides with the movement of a massive migrant caravan — the largest in more than a year — heading north.
At least 8,000 asylum seekers – mostly from Cuba, Haiti and Honduras – left for the US on Sunday.
That number could rise to 15,000 people, migrant rights activist Luis Garcia Villagran warned.
Migrants walk along a highway in Huixtla, Mexico, on Monday. AP
There have also been more than 730,000 immigrant encounters at the southern border since Oct. 1, US Customs and Border Patrol sources said.
There were also several days in December alone when the Border Patrol encountered more than 10,000 people at the border, the New York Times reported.
Last week, Biden called López Obrador to discuss the worsening situation at the border, CNN said.
US officials will discuss incentives to reduce the number of migrants at the border. Juan Manuel Blanco/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
The two leaders disagreed that additional enforcement was “urgently needed” so that the previously closed main entrance could be reopened, the outlet explained.
The US usually relies on Mexico to reduce the number of southern migrants, but “the Mexicans still have quite a limited capacity,” former US Ambassador to Mexico Earl Anthony Wayne told CNN.
“Their immigration team is underfunded and small. Also, they use the National Guard occasionally to stop people but that’s only good for stopping people for short periods of time and doesn’t seem to hold up very well. And you still have a network of smugglers,” he explained.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
