COVID-19 is not scary: a huge caravan of migrants goes to the US border

A migrant caravan of nearly 2000 Hondurans is making its way through Guatemala in hopes of reaching the U.S.-Mexico border — despite risks posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and threats from the country's president to "detain everyone who entered illegally." Writes about this Fox News.

Photo: Shutterstock

The group is mainly composed of young men, although there are a few toddlers who are driven in strollers.

“We are ordered to apprehend all those who entered the country illegally and return them to the borders of the countries from which they came,” Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei said. “We will not allow foreigners who have used illegal means to enter the country and think that they have the right to come to us, infect us and put us at serious risk.”

The authorities intended to register migrants when they crossed the border and offer assistance to those who wish to return. But they decided to cross the border into Corinto without registration, so they pushed past the Guatemalan police and soldiers, who hardly tried to stop them.

However, Giammattei issued an order suspending certain constitutional rights in the provinces through which they were supposed to pass (apparently to facilitate their detention).

Within hours of crossing the border, the Guatemalan authorities reported the first death of a migrant. A man tried to climb onto a moving trailer, but fell under the wheels of a car. There are no further details.

Many migrants didn't make it far into Guatemala before they had to stop. They stretched out in small groups for miles along the highway, some catching a ride, others walking in the hot sun.

One group consisted of four teenagers, all friends and neighbors from San Pedro Sula, from where hundreds of migrants had left the night before. After seeing others doing it, the teens decided to leave.

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The youngest, 15-year-old Joy Morales, said he wants to live the "American Dream" and is looking for a way to keep his 6-month-old son at home.

“There is no work,” he said. “We are stifled by necessity.”

The chances that a large caravan of migrants will reach the border of the United States, already low before, diminish every year. Under US pressure, Mexico sent its National Guard and immigration agents to disperse the caravans.

This week, the Mexican immigration agency announced that it is ready to provide "safe, orderly and legal" migration, and will not facilitate the formation of illegal caravans. The U.S. Embassy in Honduras said U.S. immigration is now much more difficult than ever and far more dangerous due to the coronavirus.

Christian Martinez, a 19-year-old boy, embarked on this journey because he saw a way out in immigration, because there are practically no other options in Honduras.

“If we stay here, we will have to become criminals because there is no way to survive,” he said.

Already halfway to Guatemala City, Martinez and his comrades moved on foot, sometimes on horseback. They all had masks, but the pandemic is the least of their worries.

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