Dream cut short: Mexican security forces find 110 migrants inside locked tractor-trailer that was just four and a half hours away from reaching the American border
- 110 migrants from Central and South America were found inside a tractor-trailer in the northeastern Mexican state of Nuevo León
- The truck driver was pulled over near a toll booth station in the town of Galeana – located about four and a half hours from the border with the United States
- Immigration agents and local police heard voices coming from the locked container and helped the group climb out
- Two unaccompanied children were identified among the migrants and are being cared for by the National System for Integral Family Development’s local center
A group of 110 migrants from Central and South America was found inside a tractor-trailer that was headed towards Mexico’s border with the United States.
Security forces were discovered Thursday during a checkpoint on Federal Highway 57 in Galeana, a municipality in the northeastern Mexican state of the Nuevo León.
Immigration agents and municipal cops instructed the driver to pull over near a toll both to conduct the inspection when they heard voices emanating from the freight container, the National Institute of Migration said in a statement.
Video released by the agency showed the migrants sitting and standing alongside each other inside the cargo box before they were escorted out.
Security forces in Mexico found 110 migrants hidden inside a tractor trailer that was stopped Thursday near a toll booth station on a highway in Galeana, a city in the northeastern Mexican state of Nuevo León
A total of 96 Guatemalans, seven Ecuadorians, five Salvadorans and two Hondurans were discovered inside a tractor trailer Thursday in Galeana, Mexico
The group consisted of 96 Guatemalans, seven Ecuadorians, five Salvadorans and two Hondurans nationals.
At least two children were traveling without their parents. They were placed in custody of the Nuevo León of the National System for Integral Family Development.
Single adult migrants as well as 10 family units were transferred to the state’s National Institute of Migration center for processing.
Mexico’s National Institute of Migration said there were two unaccompanied children who were traveling in the group of 110 migrants from Central and South America who were being smuggled to the United States-Mexico border
According to Mexico’s National Institute of Migration, there were 10 family units within the group of 110 migrants who were discovered locked inside a tractor trailer that was four and a half hours from reaching the counter’s northern border region with the United States
The latest crackdown on the smuggling of migrants to the United States-Mexico border following the release of a U.S. Customs and Border Protection monthly report that revealed 2.4 million encounters with migrants who illegally crossed the border have been reported in fiscal year 2022, which lapses from October 1, 2021, to September 30, 2022.
At least 1.73 million migrant interdictions were documented in fiscal year 2021.
According to data released in August by the Mexican Attorney General’s Office, at least 77,498 foreign nationals have been intercepted while being smuggled by criminal organizations between 2018 and 2022.
So far in 2022, 19,723 migrants have been rescued after 28,804 were found last year.
At least 2,286 people linked to migrant smuggling have been prosecuted since December 1, 2018, the start of the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.