There is no official figure, but “this week on average almost 1,300 people crossed the Rio Grande per day from the Mexican city of Piedras Negras (Coahuila) to Eagle Pass (USA),” he confirms. 14ymedio Francisco Manrique, member of the Beta Group for the Protection of Migrants.
“The Cubans reach the banks of the river in groups of up to 60 people with Nicaraguans and some Venezuelans,” says the rescuer. “If we talk about Acuña and Piedras Negras, the passage of Antilleans through the channel exceeds 300.”
Some of these crossings were captured by journalist Ricardo Arambarri from Univisión. He confirmed the persecution of municipal police to a group of at least 17 Cubans who were running towards the flow. “It is as if the floodgates were opened so that they could reach the water.” Some fall and manage to get up to reach their goal, others are caught.
“The municipal and liaison policemen chase those who don’t pay,” says Joel Santos, a resident of Guerrero Street, which is less than 10 minutes away from the so-called Black Railroad Bridge, in Piedras Negras. “These people are passing through there. When the patrols see them, they stop them and charge them money to let them reach the shore.”
Santos affirms that Haitians, Salvadorans and Guatemalans are charged in pesos, “about 100 or 200”, but Cubans, “they ask for 100 dollars.” They are distinguished by the way they dress, affirms the local, “the brand tennis shoes, the clothes” and some are blond or dark-haired with colored eyes.
These extortions had already been evidenced by Ramón Tejera, when police stopped in Ciudad Acuña the bus in which he was traveling with several migrants, all with a transit pass. On their way to the US border, Cubans pay police fees at checkpoints and those who do not are detained, even if they have stay permits. Precisely for not paying a bribe to Immigration, Tejera was returned to the Island along with his wife and daughter.
Santos affirms that Haitians, Salvadorans and Guatemalans are charged in pesos, “about 100 or 200”, but Cubans, “they ask for 100 dollars”
The user identified as José López posted this wednesday on Facebook a video in which agents of the Specialized Police of Coahuila are observed extorting money from Central American migrants. Given the evidence, three people were arrested. The Secretary of State Public Security, Sonia Villarreal Pérez reported this Thursday on the opening of an investigation for the “collection of fees from foreigners at a checkpoint.”
If already the possibility of a parole for Cubans announced since March increased the migratory flow through Ciudad Acuña to reach Del Río (USA), which the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service (ICE) made public that The Island does not accept deportees by the Biden Government, “it will generate a major problem for Coahuila”, accepts Manrique, a rescuer from Grupo Beta. “This can overtake us, we are already seeing it.”
There is no time to challenge the Rio Grande. Local media carry out night tours, in which they have videotaped the passage of Cubans under the Black Railway Bridge. ImpactVision News shared the moment in which a family, including four adults and two minors, manage to reach Texas.
Among the figures that the Bravo River throws, is the death record. Until this Thursday, Civil Protection reports 47 deaths in their attempt to reach the US. This Wednesday morning, the discovery of a body was reported at the height of the Morelos neighborhood. Two more, one of them from the Dominican Republic, were confirmed by Eagle Pass authorities and in the afternoon neighbors reported a body floating meters from the border bridge.
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