Without water or ventilation, INM agents located 72 migrants inside a trailer in Oaxaca

A total of 72 Central American migrants, including 22 unaccompanied minors, were found crammed in the body of a cargo vehicle in Oaxaca City, reported the National Institute of Migration (INM).

In a statement, the INM specified that as part of the control and review programs, agents of the institution located the migrants when the vehicle in which they were traveling was traveling along a central avenue in the capital of the state of Oaxaca.

They noted that migrants were transported in the body of the cargo vehicle in overcrowded conditions, without water or ventilation.

The INM reported that at around 9:00 p.m. on Tuesday (local time) the agents stopped the driver of the cargo vehicle, who stopped meters ahead to get out of the unit and start his flight between the streets of the area.

The agents found 14 adult women from Guatemala and 36 adult men (30 from Guatemala, three from Honduras, two from Nicaragua and one from El Salvador) inside the box.

While of the 22 unaccompanied minors, three were girls and 18 were boys from Guatemala and one boy from El Salvador, who were placed under the guardianship and protection of the State's System for the Integral Development of the Family (DIF).

Meanwhile, the vehicle was placed at the disposal of the Attorney General's Office (FGR).

Just last Tuesday, agents from the National Institute of Migration located 133 migrants of Central American origin, inside the box of a tractor-truck in the state of San Luis Potosí.

Of the total, 127 came from Guatemala; four from Nicaragua and two from Honduras. In addition, 10 people were traveling in the family nucleus and 15 are unaccompanied minors. Of the Guatemalan migrants, 35 were women and 73 were adult men, 15 unaccompanied minors and four persons in the family nucleus.

It was just that way that on December 9 a tragic accident occurred, when a trailer suffered a rollover on the road from Tuxtla Gutiérrez to Chiapa de Corzo, in the state of Chiapas, in which 56 migrants died.

More than 160 foreigners were hiding in the vehicle, most from Guatemala, the Dominican Republic and El Salvador.

Overcrowded trips inside cargo trucks or trailers are one of the most dangerous ways migrants use to smuggle across Mexico to the United States.

Human traffickers seek routes for foreigners and sometimes park in the states of Chiapas, Tabasco, Veracruz, Oaxaca, Puebla and the State of Mexico as an intermediate stop on their journey to the United States.

The region is experiencing a record flow of migrants to the United States, whose Customs and Border Protection Office (CBP) detected more than 1.7 million undocumented immigrants on the border with Mexico in fiscal year 2021, which ended September 30.

Mexico deported more than 114,000 foreigners in 2021, according to data from the Migration Policy Unit of the country's Ministry of the Interior.

In addition, the Mexican Commission for Refugee Aid (Comar) received a record 131,448 refugee applications in 2021. Of these petitioners, more than 51,000 are Haitians.

With information from EFE

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