Mexico’s president has confirmed that the armed men who kidnapped 32 migrants in northern Mexico aimed to extort money from them and their families in the United States. The migrants were found on Wednesday abandoned by their kidnappers in a parking lot in Reynosa, Tamaulipas. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said it was for the extortion of relatives in the United States and that the kidnappers decided to free them due to a strong deployment of Mexican authorities.
This incident has brought attention to the risks faced by the migrants who cross through Mexico en route to the U.S. border each year. They are targets of extortion and kidnapping by powerful criminal groups. Human rights activists have warned about an escalating kidnapping crisis along the Tamaulipas border, especially in Reynosa.
The 32 migrants were abducted on Saturday from a commercial bus traveling from Monterrey to Matamoros, across from Texas. They were forced off the bus and taken away in five cars by armed men. The group was discovered after an anonymous caller tipped off authorities to their whereabouts around 1 p.m., according to the spokesman for the state security agency.
Majority of the migrants were from Venezuela, including 11 minors, ranging in age from a 71-year-old man to a 1-year-old baby girl. The Honduran consulate in Monterrey confirmed that six of the migrants were from Honduras, including a mother and her two teenage daughters. The state attorney general’s office said the migrants had given their testimonies and that the office has opened an investigation. The migrants are now in the custody of Mexico’s National Immigration Institute, and no one has been arrested so far in the case.
This incident comes as a record number of migrants traveled across Central America and Mexico in 2023 aiming to reach the United States. They are fleeing poverty, violence, climate change, and conflict. The situation highlights the urgent need for better protection and support for migrants in their journey.
(Reporting by Laura Gottesdiener in Monterrey and Diego Ore in Mexico City; additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
