Migrants march through Mexico calling for end to detention centers

On Sunday, around 3,000 migrants embarked on a mass protest procession in southern Mexico to demand an end to the use of detention centers. One such detention center saw 40 migrants killed in a fire last month. The migrants began their journey from Tapachula, near the Guatemalan border, with the aim of reaching Mexico City to demand changes in the treatment of migrants. The migrants come mainly from Central America, Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Colombia. Mexican authorities have used paperwork restrictions and highway checkpoints to limit tens of thousands of migrants in Tapachula, making it difficult for them to reach the US border. The organizer, Irineo Mújica, stated that the protesters are demanding the dissolution of the country’s immigration agency, whose officials have been accused of homicide over the March 27 fire. The detention centers have been called ‘jails’ by Mújica. Mexican prosecutors have said they will press charges against the agency’s top official, Francisco Garduño, who was allegedly negligent in preventing the disaster in Ciudad Juarez, despite earlier indications of problems at his agency’s detention centers.