The United States on Sunday blocked the border with Mexico in Del Rio, a Texas town where thousands of Haitian immigrants have crossed, and began expelling some of them back to their country.
Early on Sunday morning,
the US government sent three Haitian flights back to their homeland, an administration official
told the AP news agency.
The planes are expected to arrive in Port-au-Prince, the capital, on Sunday afternoon.
About a dozen Texas Department of Public Safety vehicles lined up near the bridge and river where Haitians have been crossing from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, for nearly three weeks.
There they placed a yellow tape to prevent them from using a small dam to enter the country.
Haitian immigrants cross from Del Rio, Texas, to Acuña, Mexico.
They assure that on the US side there is not enough food or water.Francisco Fajardo / Noticias Telemundo
A Mexican police officer, who did not want to give his name, said from across the border that
migrants will no longer be allowed to cross.
On the US side, about 400 agents are expected to reinforce the government's plan to expel them.
Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry wrote on Twitter Sunday that he is concerned about conditions at the border camp and that the migrants will be welcome.
[With its prime minister charged with murder, Haiti is further destabilized]
"We want to assure them that measures have already been taken to give them a better welcome upon their return to the country and that
they will not be abandoned," he
said on his Twitter account, without giving further details about the measures.
Another Haitian political leader, Elections minister Mathias Pierre, questioned on Sunday whether the nation could handle an influx of returning migrants and said the government should stop repatriation.
"We have the situation in the south with the earthquake. The economy is a disaster (and) there are no jobs," he said.
"The prime minister should negotiate with the United States government to stop these deportations at this time of crisis," he warned.
Haitian migrants seeking asylum in the United States on the Rio Grande, in Del Rio, Texas, on Sunday, September 19, 2021.Francisco Fajardo / Telemundo News
"In Haiti there is no security"
Many of the migrants have lived in Latin America for years but are now seeking asylum in the United States as economic opportunities run out in Brazil and elsewhere.
Thousands of them are living under and near a very precarious bridge in Del Rio.
Some said the recent devastating earthquake in Haiti and the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse makes them
fear returning to a country that seems more unstable than when they left.
[Texas threatens to close the border to stop 8,000 migrants waiting under a bridge to request asylum]
"There is no security in Haiti
,
"
said Fabricio Jean, a 38-year-old Haitian who came to Texas with his wife and two daughters.
"The country is in a political crisis," he added.
Lack of food increases the despair of Haitian migrants stranded in Ciudad Acuña, Mexico
Sept.
18, 202102: 30
Junior Jean watched as people cautiously carried boxes of water or bags of food through the knee-deep river water.
The 32-year-old Haitian said he lived on the streets of Chile for the past four years, resigned to looking for food in garbage cans.
"We are all looking for a better life
,
" he
settled.
Crowd estimates varied, but Del Rio Mayor Bruno Lozano said Saturday night that there were more than 14,500 immigrants in the camp under the bridge.
The immigrants pitched tents and built makeshift shelters out of giant reeds known as reeds.
Many bathed and washed clothes in the river.
With information from The Associated Press.
