Immigrant crowds crossing the US southern border include hundreds of thousands of people from as far away as China, India and Africa, recent federal government statistics show.
Apprehensions of migrants from countries such as Senegal, Mauritania, China and India entering through Mexico tripled to 214,000 in the fiscal year that ended in September, from 70,000 in the previous fiscal year, according to US Customs and Border Protection data.
In fiscal 2021, there were fewer than 19,000 migrant “encounters” from Asia and Africa, according to CBP statistics.
Overall, in fiscal 2023, CBP counted nearly 2.48 million encounters at the southern border, up 4% from 2.39 million the previous year.
“The increase in migration from Asia and Africa is extraordinary,” said Enrique Lucero, head of the Tijuana city government’s migrant support unit, across from San Diego, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. “Today, we deal with 120 nationalities and 60 different languages.”
It was the second year in a row that “encounters” along the nearly 2,000-mile border with Mexico exceeded two million, according to CBP statistics. Most immigrants come directly from Latin America and the Caribbean.
More than 200,000 migrants from as far away as China, India and Africa crossed the border in the fiscal year that ended in September, according to statistics compiled by Customs and Border Protection. Go Nakamura for the New York Post
The new group, known as “extracontinentals” poses a challenge to federal authorities because repatriating migrants to Asian and African countries is time-consuming and expensive, according to the outlet.
“That puts a lot of pressure on our operations because we don’t have longstanding relationships or agreements with many countries to facilitate immediate removal,” a US government official told the paper. “We are actively working on it.”
Immigrants from China used motorized boats to cross the Rio Grande to Texas earlier this year.REUTERS
In Mexico, authorities reported a fourfold increase in immigrants from Asia and Africa this year, the Journal reported. Travelers say they use TikTok and Facebook to share information and videos of their routes, while others use details they find online to launch their own trips.
Chinese immigrants usually go to the US southern border after flying to Brazil, Ecuador or Nicaragua, which have limited visa requirements for some nationalities.
They then go by bus or car to a hotel or house where they are placed by the smugglers. Many wore disposable wristbands like those used at resorts, with details naming the group coordinating their trip, Mexican authorities told the Journal.
Migrants who negotiated concertina wire fences attempted to cross the border from the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez earlier this month. Go to Nakamura for the New York Post
Immigrants from India more often fly to Mexico City from Europe, or cross the border through Canada, according to reports.
CBP data showed there were 189,402 encounters at the northern border in the fiscal year that ended in September, a 73 percent jump from 109,535 the previous year and a nearly sevenfold jump from two years ago.
US and Mexican authorities are also seeing more Russians arriving as they flee their homes — about 12,500 since the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, compared to 509 a year before the war.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
