It has been estimated that by the end of 2021, nearly 130,000 migrants will have descended upon Mexico and more than half of them will have come directly from Haiti. Therefore, government officials in Mexico have been scrambling to manage the recent upswing in immigration numbers from Haiti.
The lack of manpower from within Mexico's refugee assistance program has decimated its resources, which has added even more complexities to the bleak living conditions that many of the refugees have had to endure on their long journey from home.
"We've never seen such a situation here, one so dramatic, so terrible and so poorly managed by the INM (National Migration Institute, Mexico's immigration agency)," says Enrique Vidal, a migrant activist with the Fray Matías de Córdoba Center for Human Rights in Tapachula. "This is a humanitarian emergency."
The significant increase in migration from Haiti to Mexico is largely due to the fact that the Caribbean island was devastated by a 7.2 earthquake back in August. While some Haitian migrants have stated their desire to remain in Mexico, many of them have expressed their interest to continue traveling upward towards the U.S. border. A notion that has caused representatives from the U.S government to pressure Mexico to strengthen its border.
Stay tuned for more information on this developing story.
Source: NPR
