Blinken praises “progress” with Mexico to control illegal immigration international

For the second time in three weeks, immigration policy officials in the United States and Mexico met again to discuss border control. This Friday took place in Washington in very different circumstances than what happened on December 27 in the Mexican capital, when the United States recorded up to 10,000 daily irregular entries of migrants. Now, with the numbers much lower, Secretary of State Antony Blinken hailed “significant progress” since that meeting and the milestone represented by the inauguration of social democrat Bernardo Arevalo in Guatemala for cooperation on migration.

On a day when the American capital was almost deserted due to the second heavy snowfall in just three days, after two years without snowflakes, the State Department served as a meeting place for delegations. From the Mexican side, Foreign Minister Alicia Bárcena and Security Officer Rosa Aisela Rodriguez attended; Defense Secretary Luis Crescencio Sandoval; From Marina, Rafael Ojeda; From the National Institute of Migration, Francisco Garduño. On the American side, in addition to Blinken, Secretary of National Security Alejandro Mayorkas and Homeland Security Advisor Liz Sherwood Randall participated.

“I believe we have made significant progress in the three weeks since our (previous) meeting. We look forward to reviewing them today, as well as examining additional steps we can take together to advance the common goal of reducing the unprecedented flow of irregular migration.”

Among these advances, Blinken pointed to Arevalo's inauguration, which “opens up an important new area of ​​surveillance cooperation between our three countries.” “We will continue to collaborate more broadly to develop regional solutions to this historic challenge we face.”

For his part, Bárcena stressed that we, as Mexico, intend to help support this great mission, this great battle that we are all witnessing, which is high human mobility. “It is not just a problem in our region: the whole world is going through a crisis of this kind.”

At the same time, the Chancellor stressed addressing the reasons that push millions of people to leave their homelands to try to start a new life away from their country of origin. “I believe we are fully prepared to address the structural causes of migration, the factors that contribute to irregular migration and, above all, how we work together to address this issue for the benefit of the people.” Diplomacy. .

The meeting comes as Republicans and Democrats in the US Congress try to agree on immigration reform that tightens border controls and conditions for seeking asylum. Republicans, especially their hardline wing, require approval of measures in this regard to give the green light to military and economic aid to Ukraine, which is one of the major foreign policy priorities of President Joe Biden's administration.

Although it is sometimes difficult to realize the changes caused by this type of meeting, border communities recorded one immediately after the meeting. On January 2, just five days after the meeting, operations resumed at four major crossings: Eagle Pass, Texas; San Ysidro, in California; Lukeville, Arizona and the Morley pedestrian area, in the same state.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) closed the above-mentioned checkpoints after recording a sharp increase in the number of irregular crossings by migrants. Agents stationed at these points were forced to abandon their daily duties to participate in the processing of those crossing from Mexico. However, the number of officials was not sufficient for the number of arriving immigrants. Many of the new arrivals are sleeping in the open near international bridges and the wall.

Preliminary numbers from last month indicate that immigration agents arrested at least 225,000 migrants at the border with Mexico. This number broke the previous monthly maximum, which was also documented during the Biden administration, in May 2022, when 224,000 people were arrested. In the days leading up to Christmas, Customs and Border Protection agents were processing up to 10,000 migrants a day. A new caravan from Central America threatened to worsen the situation at the border, but it collapsed days later. The flow began to slow toward the end of the year, but US officials fear it will rise again in the coming weeks.

In mid-December, Lopez Obrador acknowledged that the number of people crossing from his country to the United States had increased by 30% between November and December. Days later, the Mexican president announced that he would discuss the issue in a phone call with Biden, who is seeking to prevent the crisis at the border from worsening in an election year. 62% of Americans Management refuses than the Democratic president on immigration, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average.

Biden has tried to ease border restrictions by issuing a series of humanitarian permits that favor migrants from Nicaragua, Haiti, Cuba and Venezuela. The US authorities allow entry to up to 30,000 citizens of these countries, who must complete the process through a mobile phone application and without starting the journey north. The US government has also established offices in Colombia, Guatemala and Costa Rica, where those wishing to embark on the journey to the United States can begin their operations and thus reduce the severe wave that has reached the border with Mexico in recent weeks.

Sign up here for the news From EL PAÍS América and get all the essential information about current events in the region