Mexico signs agreement with US to deport migrants from borders

Amid the surge in number of migrants at the Mexican border, Mexico has made an agreement with the United States to deport migrants from its border cities to their home countries and take several actions, CNN reported on Sunday.

According to CNN, as part of the agreement, Mexico agreed to “depressurize” its northern cities, which border El Paso, San Diego and Eagle Pass, Texas, where the mayor has declared a state of emergency. They will also implement more than a dozen actions to prevent migrants from risking their lives by using the railway system to reach the US-Mexico border, according to Mexico’s National Migration Institute.

Mexican officials met with US Customs and Border Protection officials on Friday in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico – across the border from El Paso, Texas – following the recent spike in illegal crossings into the US that temporarily closed an international bridge and paused Mexico’s main cargo train system.

Mexican officials vowed to carry out a series of 15 actions as part of the agreement, some in coordination with Customs and Border Protection and Ferromex, which includes deporting migrants to their home countries by land and air.

The country said it will carry out negotiations with the governments of Venezuela, Brazil, Nicaragua, Colombia and Cuba to confirm receipt of their citizens deported from the US-Mexico border. It will also allow US border patrol agents to expel migrants through the Ciudad Juárez International Bridge, which connects to El Paso (a city in Texas, US).

Other terms of the agreement include submitting a daily report of the number of migrants on the train system to Customs and Border Protection’s El Paso sector, establishing checkpoints along the Ferromex rail route and conducting interventions on railways and highways, according to Mexico’s National Migration Institute.

The institute said Mexico had deported more than 788,000 migrants to their home countries from January 1 to September.

American-based media outlet CNN reported citing the Department of Homeland Security Official, that the migrants count surpassed 8,600 over a 24-hour period this week and the number of people arrested on the borders has also increased from 3,500 to 8,000.

Non-profits and officials in border communities on both sides of the US-Mexico line, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, say the current spike in migration could be driven by misinformation and an increase in kidnappings in Mexico, among other things.

The busiest sectors are Del Rio, El Paso, Lower Rio Grande Valley and Tucson; each facing more than 1,000 encounters over the last 24 hours, according to the official. Eagle Pass is in the Del Rio sector.

About 6,500 migrants are in custody in El Paso alone, which “only has so many resources,” Mayor Oscar Leeser said at the news conference Saturday.

El Paso is receiving more than 2,000 additional migrants every day, D’Agostino said, and the city is expecting a “large influx” over the next few days.

“We have come to what we look at (as) a breaking point right now,” the mayor said.

The US Department of Defence has been ramping up resources at the border, including increasing the number of security personnel by 800, as already 2500 are giving their duties at border.

CNN reported about 11,000 migrants reached the Mexican border with the US in one day, last week, Bárcena said, announcing that Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador wants to meet US President Joe Biden in Washington in November to discuss migration, along with drugs and firearms trafficking.