Statement on anti-immigrant violence and racism in Mexico
Since Saturday, August 28, after a week of protests, groups of Haitian, Central American, South American, and African migrants, organized in caravans, set off on foot from the city of Tapachula, Chiapas, on Mexico's southern border with Guatemala, heading north. Led by Haitians, they demand that while their asylum applications are being processed by the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR) or their immigration regularization processes are underway with the National Institute of Migration (INM), they be allowed to move freely throughout Mexican territory. Seeking more employment opportunities and better living conditions, they demand to be able to leave the "prison-city" that the small city of Tapachula has become, where migrants from various origins have been concentrating since the reopening of Central American borders in early 2021.
The organized migrant caravans have advanced along the coastal highway of the state of Chiapas, and in several sections they were harassed and violently prevented from proceeding by military commanders of the Mexican National Guard and immigration agents from the National Institute of Migration (INM). Young people, women with children, and pregnant women have been trampled and beaten under the cameras of independent and local journalists, in a show of anti-immigrant force unprecedented in Mexico, not even under previous governments considered openly neoliberal. As a result, two INM officials were dismissed from their posts, a measure we welcome, but which we consider insufficient. Over the past few days, the caravans have been broken up in surprise operations, and the migrants have been returned to the border with Guatemala, even those with valid immigration documents.
We have observed first with disappointment, then with grief and dismay, how, since the 2019 migration contingency decree issued by the current administration, Mexico has served as the first wall of the U.S. On this occasion, we condemn the brutality against racialized migrants whose only demand is to be able to live in Mexican territory with dignity, with work, shelter, health, education, and security.
We demand an end to the violence and racism of the Mexican authorities and that their rights as migrants and asylum seekers be respected!
Stop the militarized handling of the migration issue in Mexico!
Freedom of movement is a right!
Long live the migrant struggle!
2th September 2021
CLACSO Working Groups
Borders: Mobilities, Identities and Trade
South-South Migration
This statement expresses the position of the Working Groups Borders: Mobilities, Identities and Trade and South-South Migrationor necessarily that of the centers and institutions that make up the CLACSO international network, its Steering Committee or its Executive Secretariat.
