The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, April 19, 2006, Page 12, Image 12
Mexico seeking migrant rights north of border,
but is harsh toward illegal Central Americans
(Ilarh Stevenson
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TULTITLAN, Mexico —
Considered felons by the
government, these migrants
fear detention, rape and
robbery. Police and soldiers
hunt them down at railroads,
bus stations and fleabag
hotels. Sometimes they
are deported; more often
officers simply take their
money.
While migrants in the
United States have held
huge demonstrations
in recent weeks, the
hundreds of thousands of
undocumented Central
Americans in Mexico suffer
mostly in silence.
And though Mexico
demands humane treatment
for its citizens who migrate
to the U.S., regardless of
their legal status, Mexico
provides tew protections
for migrants on its own
soil. The issue simply isn’t
on the country’s political
agenda, perhaps because
migrants make up only 0.5
percent of the population,
or about 500,000 people —
compared with 12 percent
in the United States.
The level of brutality
Central American migrants
face in Mexico was apparent
Monday, when police
conducting a raid for
undocumented migrants
near a rail yard outside
Mexico City shot to death
a local man, apparently
because his dark skin and
work clothes made officers
think he was a migrant.
Virginia Sanchez, who
lives near the railroad
tracks that carry Central
Americans north to the U.S.
I
border, said such shootings
in Tultitlan are common.
“At night, you hear
the gunshots, and it’s the
judiciales (state police)
chasing the migrants,” she
said. “It’s not fair to kill
these people. It’s not fair in
the United States and it’s
not fair here.”
Undocumented Central
American migrants
complain much more about
how they are treated by
Mexican officials than about
authorities on the U.S.
side of the border, where
migrants may resent being
caught but often praise the
professionalism of the agents
scouring the desert for their
trail.
“If you’re carrying any
money, they take it from
you — federal, state, local
police, all of them,” said
Carlos Lopez, a 28-year-old
farmhand from Guatemala
-1
crouching in a field near the
tracks in Tultitlan, waiting
to climb onto a northbound
freight train.
Lopez said he had been
shaken down repeatedly in
15 days of traveling through
Mexico. '
“The soldiers were there =
as soon as we crossed the
river,” he said. “They said,
‘You can’t cross ... unless you I
leave something for us.’”
Jose Ramos, 18, of El
Salvador, said the extortion
occurs at every stop in
Mexico, until migrants are
left penniless and begging
for food.
“If you’re on a bus, they
pull you off and search your
pockets and if you have any
money, they keep it and say,
‘Get out of here,”’ Ramos ]
oaiu.
Maria Elena Gonzalez,
who lives near the tracks,
said female migrants often
complain about abusive
police.
“They force them to strip,
supposedly to search them,
but the purpose is to sexually
abuse them,” she said.
Others said they had seen
migrants beaten to death by
police, their bodies left near
the railway tracks to make
it look as if they had fallen
from a train.
The Mexican government
acknowledges that many
federal, state and local
officials are on the take from
the people-smugglers who
move hundreds of thousands
of Central Americans north.
iRRn • conTinucDFRomii
diplomatic efforts. “We
are convinced that neither
sanctions nor the use
of force will lead to the
solution of the problem,”
he said in televised
comments.
Chinese Assistant
Foreign Minister Cui
Tianka, China’s top
~ iiiWHMul uni—11111111111 iiiiMi' ■» i i
nonproliferation official,
who also attended
Tuesday’s meeting in
Moscow, has appealed to
Iranian leaders to reach
a negotiated settlement,
the Foreign Ministry said
Tuesday.
Russia and China, which
have strong economic
ties to Iran, have opposed
punitive measures.
Dario Lopez-Mills / The Associated Press
A Central American migrant rides a train headed north on
his way to the United States near the town of Tultitlan,
on the outskirts of Mexico City on Monday.
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