Mexico deported 37 Cubans seeking to reach the United States

A group of 37 migrants from Cuba were returned to their country by Mexican authorities, state media on the island reported.

The returned Cubans - 24 men and 13 women - had left the island legally, traveling through third countries, with the intention of crossing the Mexican border and reaching the United States, details a report by the state-run Cuban News Agency (ACN).

After being tested for COVID-19, the migrants were transferred to their places of residence.

So far this year, there are 14 air operations carried out by Mexico and 39 in total between maritime and air operations from other countries with 1,680 Cubans returned to their country of origin.

Of that total, 928 were returned from Mexico, 695 from the United States, 55 from the Bahamas and two from the Cayman Islands, according to the note that cites the island's immigration authorities as a source.

In recent months, there has been a significant increase in the flow of Cuban irregular migrants seeking to travel to the United States using the sea as routes or following different routes through Central American countries.

The Cuban Government insists on demanding that the United States comply with the immigration agreements signed between the two countries and maintains that the Washington administration has not complied with these pacts for four consecutive years with a commitment to grant a minimum of 20,000 visas per year to Cubans.

They also argue that the US policy of impeding visas for Cubans, together with the complexities associated with the crisis caused by the pandemic and the intensification of the economic embargo that applies to Cuba, are stimulating factors for the migration exodus.

Analysts believe that these factors affect the phenomenon of irregular migration of Cubans as aggravating factors in the economic crisis that the country is going through, but they believe that errors in macroeconomic management that have generated shortages of commodities, shortages, partial dollarization of the economy and high inflation.

According to recent reports from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency (CBP), more than 46,000 Cubans arrived overland in that North American country from October 2021 to the end of February 2022, a five-month figure that exceeds the record of 39,303, corresponding to the entire year 2021.

In recent days, the authorities of the National Institute for Migration (INM) have tightened migration operations in the country.

Last Tuesday, INM agents found 133 migrants from Guatemala, Nicaragua and Honduras, including 15 unaccompanied minors, crammed into the refrigerated box of a tractor-truck in the state of San Luis Potosí.

Of the total, 127 come from Guatemala; four from Nicaragua and two from Honduras. In addition, people traveled in the family nucleus and 15 are unaccompanied minors.

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

Foreigners were transported in the body of the cargo vehicle in overcrowded condition, without water or ventilation.

Of the total, 14 adult women from Guatemala and 36 adult men (30 from Guatemala, three from Honduras, two from Nicaragua and one from El Salvador). 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).

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

With information from EFE

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