Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Friday his government will reinforce measures to contain migration as he seeks to help the United States cope with record numbers of people trying to reach the U.S. border.
Lopez Obrador’s comments come a day after he spoke with U.S. President Joe Biden, during which both agreed that more enforcement was needed at their shared frontier, as record numbers of migrants disrupt border trade.
“What was agreed is that we keep working together,” Lopez Obrador told a regular press conference. “We have a proposal to strengthen our plans, what we’ve been doing,” he added, without going into details.
Migrants are heading to the U.S. to escape violence, economic distress and negative impacts of climate change, according the U.N. The number of people crossing the perilous Darien Gap straddling Colombia and Central America has topped half a million this year, double last year’s record figures.
The latest tensions over the border flared up after Mexican authorities temporarily stopped expelling migrants due to an end-of-year funding crunch, according to officials.
Top U.S. officials, including U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Homeland Security chief Alejandro Mayorkas, will visit Mexico on Dec. 27 to follow up on the call, Lopez Obrador said, calling current migratory pressures “extraordinary”.
“Above all, the number of Venezuelan migrants,” he said, also mentioning Haitians, Cubans and Ecuadorians.
Lopez Obrador said Mexico would step up containment efforts on its southern border with Guatemala as his government seeks agreements with other countries to manage the northbound migrant flows, making particular mention of Venezuela.
The measures under discussion did not just involve containment, Lopez Obrador said, noting that it was important to continue efforts to promote economic development in the region, and address the root causes of migration.
The veteran leftist stressed he would continue to call for talks between the U.S. and Cuba, which has been under an American economic embargo for decades, and that talks on easing U.S. sanctions on Venezuela were “progressing.”
He said containment needed to be complemented by political moves to lower regional tensions with Venezuela and Cuba, as well as Guatemala, which has been roiled by efforts to prevent the president-elect taking office in January.
“Because one way or another, all of this encourages migration,” he said.