MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Reported instances of lacking migrants in Mexico jumped practically fourfold in 2021 from 2020, because the nation struggles to stem the circulate of undocumented folks from Central America to the United States, in line with a report launched Wednesday.
The variety of lacking foreigners grew by 292% to 349 from 89 instances, mentioned the report introduced by the Jesuits’ Missing Migrant Search Program (SJM), a human rights group.
Hundreds of hundreds of migrants traverse Mexico yearly hoping to achieve the United States, typically changing into the victims of kidnappings, murders and different crimes.
“There are locations the place drug cartels lie in anticipate migrants to drag them into their ranks,” mentioned Luis Macias, director of SJM in Mexico.
Most of the lacking got here from nations together with Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, Cuba, Ecuador and Venezuela.
According to the report 44% of the lacking migrants had been between 18 and 29 years outdated, 42% between 30 and 59 years outdated, and 14% had been beneath the age of 17.
Mexico’s National Migration Institute didn’t instantly reply a request for remark.
Of these individuals who go lacking however are later positioned, the SJM mentioned 75% had been discovered in an immigration detention heart or in short-term housing.
The report harassed there’s nonetheless important under-reporting of migrant disappearances in Mexico, worsened by a scarcity of public data made out there by authorities companies chargeable for discovering lacking folks.
“Policies aimed toward disrupting migration flows have elevated instances of detention and of (the migrants) not having the ability to talk, and consequently the variety of disappearances reported by family have elevated,” mentioned Adrian Estrada, SJM’s coordinator for migrant help in Mexico City.
(Reporting by Lizbeth Díaz; Writing by Isabel Woodford; Editing by Anthony Esposito and Richard Pullin)
