Immigration authorities in Mexico said they found 57 migrant Guatemalan teenagers crammed into a trailer on a highway near the US border on Thursday.
According to the National Institute of Migration (INM), 43 boys and 14 girls occupied the trailer of the truck along with eight men and a woman and her daughter.
All adolescents are considered to be unaccompanied migrants, that is, they were not traveling with their parents or relatives.
The vehicle was stopped for an inspection on a highway that goes to the border city of Ciudad Juárez, opposite El Paso, Texas.
The truck driver was arrested. The youngsters were transferred to a juvenile care center.
It is common for children to cross the border illegally through Mexico to join parents or relatives who have already emigrated to the United States.
Elements of the Civil Force rescued 78 migrants on January 20, of which 16 were minors, who remained crowded in a house in the Portal de San Roberto neighborhood, in Juárez, Nuevo León.
At the scene, authorities managed to capture three men, originally from Veracruz, who were supposedly going to be in charge of transferring the Central and South Americans to the border with the United States.
Migrants of Honduran, Dominican, Cuban, Guatemalan, Salvadoran, and Ecuadorian origin remained crowded in two adjoining houses.
Civil Force indicated that Juan ‘N’, 40 years old, originally from Veracruz, was arrested at the site; Miguel ‘N’, 38, also from Veracruz; and Manuel ‘N’, 34 years old, originally from Nuevo León.
The three are being investigated for the alleged crime of human trafficking.
The undocumented people received medical attention and were later transferred to the National Migration Institute branch in Nuevo León.
Immigration authorities in Mexico said they found 57 migrant Guatemalan teenagers crammed into a trailer on a highway near the US border on Thursday . . .
