Mexico: investigation opened for "homicide" after death of 39 migrants in fire

A member of the Mexican National Guard stands guard outside a hospital where injured migrants are being treated after a fire at an immigration detention center, in Ciudad Juarez, March 29, 2023. REUTERS - JOSE LUIS GONZALEZ

Text by: RFI Follow

3 min

A thousand migrants tried to cross the border between Mexico and the United States on Wednesday, after the tragedy that left 39 people dead in a detention center in Ciudad Juarez.

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What happened in the detention center in Ciudad Juarez, on the border with the United States? On the night of Monday to Tuesday, 39 migrants died in a fire and about twenty others were injured, some very seriously.

The investigation for "homicide" opened Wednesday by the Mexican authorities will shed light on the circumstances of this tragedy. So far, eight alleged perpetrators have been identified. They are suspected of having done nothing to save the migrants, the human rights prosecutor's office said.

Inaction by detention centre staff

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None of the officials or private security police carried out any action to open the door to the migrants who were inside while there was fire," human rights prosecutor Sara Irene Herrerías Guerra told a news conference on Wednesday.

A 32-second video from CCTV footage – whose authenticity has been confirmed – shows the start of the fire on the night of Monday to Tuesday. Behind bars, in the smoke, one man kicks against a closed door while another appears to be laying a mattress on the floor.

In the foreground, three officers retreat with their backs on people locked behind bars, without providing assistance. The alleged perpetrators – three agents of the National Institute of Migration (INM) and five agents of a security company – "are already being heard" by the prosecutor's office, the prosecutor said.

A migrant was also "flagged" by other migrants as the person responsible for the fire, she added, without elaborating. Authorities confirmed that the fire was started by migrants to protest their possible deportation.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador vowed that there would be no "impunity" by calling for "those who caused this painful tragedy to be punished in accordance with the law."

Rumors

The authorities have still not given details of the nationality of the victims, mentioning their countries of origin, mainly from Central America (Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras) and Venezuela, whose nationals are numerous each year trying to flee poverty and violence. Guatemala claimed on Tuesday that 28 of its nationals had died. El Salvador spoke of four seriously injured, calling for those responsible for the tragedy to be brought to justice.

As a result of this tragedy, "More than 1,000 migrants" tried to cross the border between Mexico and the United States on Wednesday on Wednesday, said US border guards, adding that they will be deported. A rumor circulated among the migrants that the United States was willing to receive some of them on humanitarian grounds.

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The border is closed to illegal immigration!" the US consulate said on Twitter in a Spanish-language message titled "Don't be fooled."

Since 2014, an estimated 7,661 migrants have died or gone missing on their way to the United States, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

(

With AFP)

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Read on on the same topics:

• Mexico
• United States
• International migration
• Immigration
• Refugees

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