Fire at Migrant Center in Mexico Near U.S. Border Kills at Least 39 Mary Beth Sheridan and Adela Suliman - The Washington Post
go to original March 28, 2023

Fire at Mexico migrant facility kills at least 39 (Reuters)

Update: Mexico President Assigns Blame Elsewhere for Migrant Tragedy (Associated Press)

A fire broke out at a migrant detention facility just south of the U.S. border, killing at least 39 people in one of the deadliest tragedies in years involving foreigners apprehended while trying to reach the United States, Mexican authorities said Tuesday.

Mexico’s National Migration Institute said the blaze started just before 10 p.m. Monday in the sleeping area of its facility in Ciudad Juárez, just south of El Paso. Sixty-eight men were staying in the building, according to the government-run institute. Most of the dead were Central Americans, although some were from Venezuela, said President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The Mexican Attorney General’s Office said the list of dead and injured included 28 Guatemalans, 13 Hondurans, 12 Salvadorans, 12 Venezuelans and one citizen each from Colombia and Ecuador. It did not provide a further breakdown of the dead.

It appeared that the fire was sparked during a protest by migrants who had learned they were going to be deported, the president said at a morning news conference. “In the door of the shelter they put some mattresses and set them on fire,” López Obrador said. “They never imagined that would cause this tragedy.”

Firefighters and military personnel swarmed the site near the Santa Fe International Bridge and put out the flames. But it was too late for many of the migrants. Rescue workers laid out bodies in rows outside the facility; they were covered by foil thermal sheets.

Read the rest at Washington Post

Related: Deadly Fire Highlights Immigration Pressures on Mexico (Associated Press)

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