The US, EU and Spain on Thursday pledged more than US$85 million in aid to Mexico and other Central American countries to offer alternatives to would-be migrants seeking a better life.
Washington has pledged US$57 million on top of US$310 million in humanitarian aid for the region announced in April by US Vice President Kamala Harris, a US government official said in Costa Rica ahead of a presidential summit.
“This money will be used to support efforts in building asylum systems, enabling governments to address the pressures of the migration itself,” Amy Pope, a senior advisor to US President Joe Biden on migration, told a gathering in San Jose.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“This is part of President Biden’s much comprehensive approach to migration, is not all about the United States border, it is about what is happening that causes people to feel that they do not have any other choice than to flee,” she said.
Pope spoke at an event in solidarity with forcibly displaced people preceding a summit of heads of state and government of member states of the Central American Integration System, and Spain.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez told the event that his government would contribute US$7.6 million to the cause, while the EU pledged another US$22.5 million.
“We recognize that without a regional solution, we cannot address this problem,” Pope said.
Undocumented migration from Central America to the US has been on the increase since 2018, constituting a major issue for the Biden administration.
Detentions of undocumented migrants, many fleeing poverty or violence at home, hit a 15-year-high along the US-Mexico border in April, with nearly 180,000 people intercepted, US authorities said.
Biden is allowing unaccompanied minors to stay and be united with relatives living in the country.
The Republican opposition has accused Biden of creating a “crisis” on the country’s southern border.
Harris, on a visit to Mexico and Guatemala this week, said that countries must work together to address the root causes of the problem, but told would-be migrants “do not come” to the US.
“The United States will continue to enforce our laws and secure our borders... If you come to our border, you will be turned back,” she said.
Earlier on Thursday, Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei said that the Biden administration was tempting migrants through what he called humanitarian messages.
“Because there they said: ‘We are going to encourage family unification.’ And the coyotes [smugglers] took children and adolescents to the US, and the border filled up, not just with people from Guatemala. A ton of people,” Giammattei told Fox News.
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