The presidents and foreign ministers of a dozen Latin American countries will discuss mechanisms that contribute to orderly migration this Sunday in Mexico, at a time when tens of thousands of people are trying to reach the border with the United States.

The presidents of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, of Cuba, Miguel Díaz Canel and of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, among others, arrived at the summit, which started at 12:00 local time (18:00 GMT) according to the official programme.

It takes place at the archaeological site of Palenque, in the Mexican state of Chiapas (in the south), bordering Guatemala and where poverty and violence travel most of those who leave their country.

Before the meeting, the dignitaries were given a private tour of the archaeological zone, accompanied by their host, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who hours later published a photo on X (formerly Twitter) with his guests.

“The Palenque Meeting, for a fraternal and well-being neighborhood, is a call to combine efforts, willpower and resources to address the causes of the migration phenomenon,” the Mexican president wrote.

“This is a humanitarian issue on which we must work together,” added López Obrador, who appears flanked by Maduro, Díaz-Canel, Petro, Honduras’ Xiomara Castro and Haiti’s Prime Minister Ariel Henry.

Meanwhile, a group of undocumented immigrants held a protest in Tapachula, a border town and the first concentration point for migrants in Mexico.

They burned three piñatas with the faces of Presidents Maduro and Díaz Canel, as well as Nicaraguan Daniel Ortega, with a sign that read: “Top of oppressors.”

The meeting will “analyze the causes of human mobility, such as poverty, inequality, lack of employment” and “examine coordinated actions” for the orderly movement of people, the Mexican Foreign Ministry said.

Belize, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala and Panama are represented by officials of various ranks.

The vast majority of the 1.7 million migrants Mexico says will have reached the U.S. border in 2023, which the International Organization for Migration considers the “world’s most dangerous land route,” come from all these countries.

“What I can assume from that meeting is that they are going to decide on the deportation of all of us who are on the way,” he told police. AFP Jorge Rodríguez, a 33-year-old Venezuelan resting with other migrants in a shelter for Catholic nuns in Palenque.

Rodríguez left his country two months ago and walked through the dangerous jungle of Darién, on the border between Colombia and Panama.

He knows that last Wednesday the first flight of Venezuelans deported from the United States arrived in Caracas following an agreement between the government of Joe Biden and Maduro, despite the fact that Washington does not formally recognize him as president.

“It is a mean and dirty thing to use us as the card they have up their sleeve. Money for your wallet (from the government). “And what about the Venezuelan?” adds Rodríguez, who also reports that Biden has relaxed economic sanctions on Caracas.

The immigration crisis is one of the obstacles Biden faces in re-election in 2024, with continued accusations from Republicans and even allies that he has failed in that area.

Biden asked Congress on Friday for $13.6 billion to strengthen the border with Mexico, control irregular migration and combat fentanyl, within a package of more than $105 billion to help Ukraine and Israel and counter China.

The Democrat arrived at the White House in 2021 with the border closed due to the pandemic. After reopening, it took several measures against Venezuelans, Haitians, Cubans and Nicaraguans.

“There is a lot of confusion, the information is sometimes incorrect and that causes migration to flow more,” he says AFP Evelina Ramírez, psychologist at the shelter and witness to how the flow increases with each new American announcement.

Upon arrival in southern Mexico, he adds, the migrants discover that they must be at the northern border to obtain these benefits and go clandestinely without waiting for a permit from Mexico, making them easy prey for the organized crime and the authorities themselves.

“We see how the immigration situation is deteriorating every day,” says Ramírez, concerned about the arrival of “drug cartels” in Chiapas, which was previously untouched by violence but which, she confirms, is now the site of migration control disputes. (JO)