by WorldTribune Staff, April 3, 2018
U.S. President Donald Trump on April 3 said he may send the military to guard the border as a convoy of some 1,500 mostly-Honduran illegal aliens continued to trek north toward the U.S. in a bid for asylum.
“We are going to be guarding our border with our military. That’s a big step,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “We cannot have people flowing into our country illegally, disappearing, and by the way never showing up for court.”
The president also said he had spoken with Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis about the use of the military to guard the border.
Mexico’s National Institute of Immigration (INM) said that it plans by April 4 to disband the caravan that has been traveling unimpeded through Mexico for nine days.
Mexico’s Interior Ministry said in a statement on April 2 that about 400 participants in the caravan, which began March 25, had already been sent back to their home countries, and, unlike in previous years, “this time Mexican immigration authorities have offered refugee status” to participants who qualify.
“Under no circumstances does the Mexican government promote irregular migration,” the Interior Ministry statement said.
Caravan organizers told BuzzFeed that at least some of the illegals will continue to the U.S. border.
“At the end of the day these people have the right to ask for asylum,” said Gina Garibo, one of the organizers for Pueblos Sin Fronteras, the volunteer group that organized the caravan.
She denied the caravan would be disbanded. “We have to follow through with our promise” to help people gain asylum in the United States or Mexico, she said, adding the illegals would continue moving but in smaller groups than the caravan.
In a previous statement, Pueblos Sin Fronteras had said: “We demand of the Mexico and the United States: that they respect our rights as refugees and our right to dignified work to be able to support our families.”
The group also demanded “that they open the borders to us because we are as much citizens as the people of the countries where we are and/or travel.”
Trump tweeted about the caravan on April 3: “The big Caravan of People from Honduras, now coming across Mexico and heading to our ‘Weak Laws’ Border, had better be stopped before it gets there. Cash cow NAFTA is in play, as is foreign aid to Honduras and the countries that allow this to happen. Congress MUST ACT NOW!”
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