More Central Americans risk perilous trek to US to flee poverty and violence
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Version 0 of 1. Pregnant and with a young child in her arms, Andy Lizette Navarro has dreams of America. The 17-year-old says she has lost hope for the future in her semi-deserted mountain hamlet deep in rural Honduras. There are few options in El Guantillo, whose residents derive a living primarily from corn, beans and coffee grown in the surrounding mountains. Many are unemployed and rely on seasonal work harvesting coffee to scrape by. Most young men migrate north, and the hamlet now comprises mainly women, children and the elderly. "In this village, there is no future for me and my children," says Navarro outside her family's modest, dirt-floor adobe home, explaining why she will soon risk the long journey north. "We have to leave." El Guantillo is typical of villages across Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador that produce a steady stream of migrants seeking work and a better life in the US. Driven out largely by poverty and gang violence, the wave has swelled in recent months, although with a new dynamic as more children make the trek – many travelling alone. President Barack Obama has asked Congress for more than $2bn (£1.2bn) in emergency funds to deal with the surge. He also plans to boost security on the southern US border and speed up the deportation of migrants, including children, a White House official said. The push is aimed at persuading people like Navarro to stay at home rather than embark on the long, dangerous journey. But she says her sister Rosa, 18, made it to St Louis, Missouri, with her young daughter this month after paying a human smuggler, or "coyote", $3,500 to help her through Guatemala and Mexico and across the border. "If my sister can make it, I can too," Navarro says. Two months pregnant and with her son not yet two, Navarro plans to travel soon – before it becomes too difficult for her. During the eight months that ended on 15 June, an estimated 52,000 children were detained at the US border with Mexico, most of them from Central America. That was double the previous year's tally, and tens of thousands more are believed to have slipped through. Coyotes are spurring on migrants by spreading the word that pregnant women and unaccompanied minors are treated more leniently and are allowed to stay in the US, although the government insists they will be sent back home. "Rumours are being spread that the US will receive and help young people and children and their mothers and fathers who get in illegally," says Iris Acosta, who grew up in El Guantillo and teaches at the school here. She said parents pulled 22 children aged between five and 14 out of the school between February and May, all bound for the US. Local residents estimate that more than 1,500 people – about a third of the population – have deserted the village, especially in the past 15 years. Many homes sit empty, although others – some large, well made and brightly coloured – have sprung up, built by migrants who have spent years in the US but plan to return home one day to a nice house, and with some savings. Navarro, a single mother, earns up to $7.50 a day during the coffee harvest, but it lasts only a few months a year and she has no other work. Almost a fifth of Hondurans live on less than $1.25 a day, the World Bank says, but it is not just poverty that sends them packing. Health and education services are bad, violent youth gangs in effect control sections of major cities and towns, and UN data shows Honduras has the world's highest murder rate, at 90.4 homicides per 100,000 people. Fabian Gutiérrez, a local coffee grower, plans to hire a coyote to get his 16-year-old son, Fabricio, to Miami, where the boy's uncle has been living for years, rather than have him look for work in Honduras's capital, Tegucigalpa. "Here there is no future, no work. He has finished his basic education and if I send him to Tegucigalpa with a cousin, the gangs could kill him or he could turn into a gang member himself. It's better to send him to the US." Recent US policy changes have sparked confusion and contributed to the rising numbers. In 2011, US immigration authorities gave its officials discretion to weigh various factors in apprehension, detention and deportation, particularly in the case of minors. Then, in 2012, the government said young illegal immigrants who had been in the US since 2007 and met requirements could apply for a two-year authorisation to stay and work. Coupled with fewer children being deported, many Central Americans believe US immigration policy has become more lax. But risks abound on the trip north: murder, robbery, sexual abuse and serious accidents on freight trains. Locals say at least five villagers from El Guantillo have lost limbs after falling off Mexico's infamous "La Bestia" freight train, which travels daily from Chiapas near Mexico's border with Guatemala, to Mexico City. Thousands of migrants sit on top of the train as it heads north and accidents are frequent. Though fewer Mexicans are crossing into the US, which pushes down the overall numbers, more Central Americans are making the journey, and relentless violence is a major reason. "If youths want to go out to play, they kill them … If they want to study, they face threats. It is overwhelming them," said Ana Zelaya, secretary of a rights group in El Salvador that helps relatives of dead and missing migrants. At some 2,000 miles (3,200km) long, the US-Mexico border is difficult to police properly. And though for years illegal immigrants would cross in more remote areas, lawyers say many minors now turn themselves in, as they are often sent to live with relatives pending immigration hearings. The favoured crossing point is the Rio Grande valley on the Texas border, where 37,621 unaccompanied children were stopped between October and mid-June, up 178% from a year before. In Guatemala, where about 54% of the population is poor, according to UN data, villages are also emptying. San José Calderas, which is tucked away among volcanoes around 40 miles (64km) from Guatemala City, offers little in the way of work beyond subsistence farming of beans, corn and vegetables. A couple of local families raise chickens to sell eggs, and the remaining men look for scarce jobs in construction. "There is no work for the men here, much less for women," said Maria Gómez, a 33-year-old mother of four who lives off the money her husband sends home each month from Iowa. When US authorities raided a meat-packing plant in Iowa in 2008 and deported about 300 workers and their families, half were from San José Calderas. Few were deterred and many, like her husband, used coyotes to return to the US. |