Harris to travel to Mexico and Guatemala in first foreign trip as vice president

05/05/2021

Vice President Kamala Harris will visit Mexico and Guatemala on June 7 and 8, she said during a visit to Rhode Island on Wednesday. This will be Harris’ first trip abroad as vice president. 

Harris also said she will be talking to Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador this week. He said at his daily press briefing that he would be speaking with Harris about U.S.-bound immigration.

In March, President Biden tasked Harris with leading the administration’s efforts to stem migration at the southern border, announcing her new role as border apprehensions soared after Mr. Biden took office. He called her the “most qualified person” to lead U.S. efforts with Mexico and the Northern Triangle, and he said he hoped “we can move this along.”

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Young Migrants Cross US-Mexico Border Alone

05/02/2021

Source: Voice of America

After a 3,000-kilometer trip, 16-year-old Jose Luis Boyeduana arrived in the United States.

At the end of 2020, he decided to travel from his home in Ecuador to reunite with his parents living in the U.S. It had been 13 years since he had seen them. Boyeduana had been living with his grandparents in Ecuador since he was three years old.

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‘I’m trapped here’: Haitian asylum seekers languish in Mexico

04/24/2021

Source: Aljazeera

Tijuana, Mexico – Each morning, Samuel* leaves the cramped, single-room apartment he shares with a dozen other Haitian asylum seekers in central Tijuana and wanders over to the makeshift migrant camp that he used to call home.

Until last month, he had lived peacefully at El Chaparral, a sprawling migrant tent city near the US-Mexico border wall, alongside Haitians and asylum seekers from other countries, all waiting to try to get into the United States.

But Samuel says the atmosphere gradually shifted to one of hostility.

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Op-Ed: Kamala Harris’ border mission should be a Mexico mission too

04/26/2021

Source: Los Angeles Times

The Biden administration should avoid the Trump-era mistake of reducing the entirety of the U.S.-Mexico relationship to the single issue of immigration. The administration has made Vice President Kamala Harris its point person at the southern border, and she has been engaging with Mexico and Central American nations to embrace a regional approach to migration, which is laudable. But starting with her May 7 meeting with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, announced over the weekend, the vice president should broaden the scope of her Mexico agenda to cover the complex array of economic, environmental, security, energy and rule of law issues that define the U.S.-Mexico dealings.

Mexico is heading in the wrong direction, and it is time for the United States to take notice and prioritize a relationship that is crucial to our common well-being. Because ties across the Rio Grande simultaneously involve so many sensitive foreign and domestic issues, the vice president is uniquely suited to coordinate Mexico policy. The role should be familiar to President Biden; it’s much like the one then-President Obama asked him to take on under the framing of a “High Level Economic Dialogue” between Mexico and the U.S. in 2013.

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Trees for visas: Mexico suggests US citizenship for reforestation

04/22/2021

Source: Reuters

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Thursday suggested the U.S. government offer temporary work visas and eventually citizenship to those who take part in a vast tree planting program he hopes to expand to Central America.

In remarks at a White House virtual climate summit, Lopez Obrador said that Mexico aimed to expand his administration’s signature “Sembrando Vida,” or “Sowing Life,” program to Central America, which he said is planting 700,000 trees.

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‘I don’t feel safe’: Migrants face attacks, threats in Mexico

04/21/2021

Source: Aljazeera

“Every time I see my daughters suffering here, I feel a lump in my throat. I cry during the nights.”

That is how a mother from Honduras describes her life in Piedras Negras, a Mexican city across the border from the US state of Texas, after she was expelled from the United States last month with her two- and seven-year-old daughters and other members of her family. Members of a gang she had testified against in Honduras tracked her to Mexico, she said, fuelling fears of violence.

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Mexico plans 17 shelters for children on southern border

04/22/2021

Source: AP News

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico said Wednesday it is planning to set up 17 shelters for underage migrants along the country’s southern border, as well as some along the northern border with the United States, amid a wave of child migrants coming from Central America.

The shelters will largely be set and run by Mexico’s child welfare agency, which may use some of its own existing day care centers or other facilities.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Wednesday that the situation is “very worrisome” and the expanded capacity was needed to look out for the welfare of the minors.

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UNICEF reports sharp rise in migrant children in Mexico

04/20/2021

Source: UN News

Children comprise at least 30 per cent of migrants in Mexican shelters, who come from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and the country itself. Half have travelled without their parents, which is among the highest proportions ever recorded in Mexico.

Jean Gough, UNICEF Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, wrapped up a five-day visit to Mexico, which included stops along the northern border with the United States.

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AMLO to propose extending social programme to Central America

04/19/2021

Source: Aljazeera

Mexico’s president has said he plans to propose to his US counterpart Joe Biden a plan to extend to Central America a key Mexican social programme, as part of ongoing efforts to stem migration to the United States.

In a video message on Sunday, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he wants to propose offering the Sembrando Vida programme, which provides work and support for the agricultural sector in Central America.

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Big rise in numbers of migrant children on Mexico-US border

04/19/2021

Source: BBC News

The number of migrant children trying to reach the US from Mexico has increased ninefold since the start of 2021, UN children’s agency Unicef says.

The rise from 380 to nearly 3,500 has overwhelmed the facilities at Mexico’s reception centres, it says.

The children are mainly from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Mexico itself. Half arrived without parents.

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