The detention of Cubans in the Acayucan Migration Center, in the state of Veracruz (Mexico), has become a way of collecting money for the officials’ coffers, reveals 14ymedio the lawyer José Luis Pérez Jiménez.
Due to the fact that the Migration Law does not establish a defined amount as bail to release foreigners from migratory centers, the Legal Department “interprets in its favor the article 102, subsection A” and determines, as it considers, the money that it will demand to grant the exit of the people.
This legislative loophole, says the migrant defender, “allowed the Legal Department of downtown Acayucan, under the direction of Ulises Sánchez Molina, to set a bond of 10,000 Mexican pesos for the release of each of the eight Cubans” that he defended and achieved. release last week.
Since most of them “do not have financial solvency”, only the amount corresponding to Lázaro Manuel Álvarez Cruz, Orlando Rivero González and Eddy Gonzlez Gonzlez.
Around 500 migrants are currently detained in the Acayucan migration center, 97 of them are Cuban and some have a trade to be able to transit through the country.
These migrants were arrested on March 24 at kilometer 19 of the highway that goes from Villahermosa to La Choapas, in Veracruz. And along with them were Carla Elisa Vásquez Corrida, Damicela Pérez Concepción, Danyela Muñoz Pérez, Adrián Pérez Dominico, Nicdael Ángel Borges Concepción. All, says the lawyer, “are dissidents and participated in the July 11 demonstration in San Antonio de los Baños.”
Around 500 migrants are currently detained in the Acayucan immigration center, 97 of them are Cuban and some have a trade to be able to transit through the country. The high number of arrests is caused by irregularities and the collection of fees. Every day thousands of foreigners are detained and admitted to state stations.
“They do it because the Migration agents have to deliver a fee to the head of the representative office and the latter to the national commissioner,” denounces the defender who proposed to the Mexican Congress to add to article 102 of the Migration Law an amount of bail and that the money that enters the National Migration Institute (INM) for this concept be controlled to avoid “petty cash”.
“There’s the goose that lays golden eggs“, assures Pérez. “The guy For migrants and lawyers, it is that when they have a detained client and they do not know how much the bail is, they can deposit the equivalent of one day’s wages in the Banco de Bienestar, which is 172 pesos and 80 cents, and show it to Immigration, with which they comply with the tabulator marked in the article 21 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States.
The Acayucan immigration station “is a prison where human rights do not exist,” says Wilmer Mantos, a 27-year-old Cuban who was released after 37 days. “There you are without a cell phone, without papers, you eat out of hunger, but the food is spoiled and there is almost no water and they don’t even provide you with medical assistance.”
Zoileny Soto Almenteros, a musician from Caibarién, in central Cuba, spent 50 days detained in Acayucan. The food and water they gave her during her stay caused discomfort in the young woman. The reason, she later learned, was the high iodine content. After this nightmare on her journey through Mexico, she has been in the state of Kentucky (USA) for a week.
At the beginning of March, relatives and friends of the detained migrants blocked the entrance principal of the ranch to demand his release. Some managed to get out days later, but others still remain in place.
Attacks on migrants are a recurring theme. The Institute for Security and Democracy, AC Insyde, showed in 2017 that “one in three migrants who were detained in Veracruz suffered some physical, psychological or verbal aggression at the time of immigration verification,” the report reads. “Only one in ten people detained by the INM denounces the attacks suffered.”
This Monday a group of Cubans burned some mats and clothes in protest at keeping them “deprived of their liberty.” The authorities indicate that they are leading a riot, the third so far this month.
“The rights of these people and those of free transit are being violated,” he tells 14ymedio Gabriel Domínguez, defender of migrants from the Island, showing the official letter with folio 4840 endorsed by the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH), the National Commission for Refugee Aid (Comar) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Elements of the National Guard, an anti-riot squad and state police arrived at the scene in support of the immigration agents. Anomalies at this site have been evidenced by this journal.
On the other hand, this Tuesday 17 Cubans were detained at the Puebla Passenger Bus Station. An anonymous call alerted Immigration and the National Guard about the transfer on a bus headed to Mexico City. The natives of the Island said that they left the state of Chiapas, which borders Guatemala.
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