The migrant caravan, which set off from Honduras over a week ago, has expanded to 5000 members and is moving north toward the United States, The Hill reports.
Over the weekend the migrants reached the Guatemala-Mexico border and some of them applied for refugee status in Mexico. However, many more continued trekking north, despite warnings that authorities will do everything in their power “to stop the onslaught of illegal aliens from crossing” the U.S.-Mexico border.
“People have to apply for asylum in Mexico first, and if they fail to do that, the U.S. will turn them away. The courts are asking the U.S. to do things that are not doable!” President Donald Trump tweeted Sunday.
Also on Sunday, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said they will “closely monitor the caravan crisis.”
According to Mexican federal police officers, the group of migrants was headed for Tapachula, a city about 37 kilometers (23 miles) north of the Mexico-Guatemala border, where they were to be taken to shelters, carried there by buses instructed to drive the migrants.
According to CNN, some of the group were Mexicans who had joined the caravan.
Mexican authorities further said that from Friday to Sunday, 1,028 people requested asylum in the country, and another 346 in “vulnerable” condition were transferred to a shelter in the state of Chiapas. The authorities had said earlier that priority was given to elders, children and women and that more than 2,000 migrants remained on the bridge connecting Mexico to Guatemala.
For now, it remains unclear whether the caravan will be allowed to reach the U.S. border, and Mexican authorities have said only people with valid visas will be able to enter the country. Some can seek recognition as refugees or as beneficiaries of “complementary protection measures.”
Those who enter illegally will be subject to an administrative procedure and, where appropriate, will be returned to their country of origin.
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