Five people have been detained for the fire in an immigration detention center in Mexico’s Ciudad Juárez (on the border with the United States), which left 39 dead and 27 injured last Monday, the Attorney General’s Office reported Thursday.
“Five” arrest warrants have already been executed, said the prosecutor specializing in Human Rights, Sara Irene Herrerías, at a press conference in which it was detailed that the deceased were 18 Guatemalans, 7 Salvadorans, 7 Venezuelans, 6 Hondurans and one Colombian. .
“In the course of the day, the imputation and linkage hearing is held, which means that they have already been made available to the judge,” added the prosecutor.
The official specified that a judge issued a total of six arrest warrants against three officials of the National Institute of Migration (INM), two private security guards and a migrant who would have started the fire, accused of intentional homicide and injuries. However, she did not specify who the detainees were.
In the same conference, the Secretary of Public Security, Rosa Icela Rodríguez, revealed the nationality of the fatalities and said that the injured are 5 Salvadorans, 10 Guatemalans, 8 Hondurans and 5 Venezuelans. Of them, only one was discharged.
Rodríguez announced that the government is evaluating the help it will provide to the families of the victims, at the same time that it began an administrative process to revoke the contract and impose a fine on the company in charge of the security of the compound.
The fire at the INM station broke out on Monday night, after at least one migrant set mattresses on fire in the middle of a protest over possible deportation, according to authorities.
On Wednesday, the authorities indicated that the staff in charge of the detention center did nothing to evacuate the migrants and that eight people had been identified as allegedly responsible for that omission.
A surveillance video was also added to the investigation by the authorities in which it is observed when the flames start without the managers apparently opening the cell where the detained migrants were.
The tragedy highlighted the harsh treatment migrants receive. A report by the International Organization for Migration indicates that since 2014 some 4,400 people have died or disappeared on the 3,180 km border between Mexico and the United States.
President Joe Biden’s policies force citizens of Ukraine, Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti to request asylum from the countries through which they transit or to arrange appointments online.
The Democrat is accused by the Republican opposition of having lost control of the border, with more than 4.5 million people intercepted without papers in that region since he took office.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
