The United States and Mexico announced this Tuesday the signing of an agreement to facilitate the reunification of migrant children who are in Mexican territory and have their father or mother on the other side of the border, to prevent their families from placing them in the hands of of coyotes, who sometimes abandon them to their fate during the dangerous crossing, as recently happened to two Salvadoran girls rescued on an island in the Rio Grande.
More than 12,000 minors arrived in Mexico irregularly without the company of an adult in 2022, and nearly 6,000 were returned to their countries of origin, according to data from the Mexican authorities.
A migrant child stands next to a fence at an entry point for asylum seekers in Tijuana, Mexico, on December 21, 2022. Marcio Jose Sanchez / AP
The head of the Unit for North America of the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Roberto Velasco, explained in an act with US authorities that the reunifications will be carried out through the Comprehensive Family Development agency, according to the agency news The Associated Press.
[More than 1,000 migrant children separated from their families by the Trump administration have not yet been reunited with their parents]
This agreement is intended to prevent families from resorting to the usual practice of paying traffickers to take their children to the United States illegally, which puts their lives at risk, he said.
Velasco calculated that hundreds of families could benefit from this agreement, signed just a week after the president, Joe Biden, met in Mexico with his counterpart, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
He did not specify, however, which children will be eligible to benefit from the program or what requirements they must meet.
Promotion of legal migration
The United States and Mexico also signed an agreement Tuesday that encourages labor migration, expanding the number of temporary work visas and stepping up enforcement to make sure workers' rights are respected once in the US.
"Regular migration benefits everyone: companies, workers and their labor rights, the economies, as well as the order and legality of the two countries," said Velasco, "we seek to set an example to the entire world on how they can ally countries to promote labor rights".
The mother of the girls found in the Rio Grande says they are in danger if they are deported to El Salvador
Jan 17, 202302:05
The agreement contemplates hiring
more non-immigrant Mexicans on H-2B temporary work visas
, protecting their wages and working conditions, and further facilitating the availability of temporary Mexican farm labor in accordance with the laws of both countries.
With information from
The Associated Press
.
