39 Dead After Fire in Migrant Detention Center in Juarez

"Socalj" for Borderland Beat

A fire at a migrant detention center in Ciudad Juárez left 39 dead and 29 injured, the National Migration Institute (INM) said in a statement Tuesday.

The fire started on Monday night at a facility of the Mexican immigration agency next to the border with El Paso, in a dormitory area where "68 men of legal age from Central and South America were staying," the statement added. President AMLO stated that the migrants likely began to set mattresses on fire upon learning of their imminent deportations.

The injured were transferred "in delicate-serious condition to four local hospitals for immediate care." The authorities were investigating the cause of the fire and called the National Human Rights Commission, an official entity, to attend to the migrants. In addition, they began working with consular officials from various countries to identify the deceased.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador lamented the death of 39 migrants in a shelter in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, "this had to do with a protest that they started," he said.

"To report something very unfortunate, very sad last night at around 9:30PM at night there was a fire in a migrant shelter on the border in Ciudad Juárez and so far we have a report that 39 migrants lost their lives," he stated at the beginning of the conference at the National Palace.

He explained the reasons for the event: "We assume that they found out that they were going to be deported, mobilized, and as a protest at the door of the shelter they put mattresses from the shelter and set them on fire and they did not imagine that this was going to cause this terrible misfortune."

"The National Institute of Migration strongly rejects the acts that led to this tragedy," the note added, without clarifying what actions it was referring to.

Immigrant detention centers have been the scene of occasional protests and riots, especially at times of high immigration flows and when detention facilities are more crowded. However, an incident as deadly as the one on Monday night was not remembered.

According to the website of the NGO "Sin Fronteras", which monitors Mexican immigration facilities, those in Ciudad Juárez have a capacity for 60 people.

Ciudad Juárez is an important transit point for migrants arriving in the United States. Its shelters are full of migrants waiting for opportunities to cross or who have applied for asylum in the United States and are waiting for their cases to be processed.

Previous Incidents

At the beginning of March, more than 30 civil organizations and migrant shelters issued a statement in which they denounced the growing criminalization of foreigners in the city, as well as the existence of "arbitrary detentions where municipal agents question the immigration status of people, they extort them, tear up documentation and steal money and other belongings.”

A recent report from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reveals that from 2014 to date, some 7,661 migrants have died or disappeared on their way to the United States and 988 have died in accidents or from traveling in subhuman conditions.

In October, Venezuelan migrants rioted inside a Tijuana immigration center that had to be controlled by police and National Guard troops. In November, a similar situation occurred in the Tapachula detention center, near the border with Guatemala. There were no fatalities in either of those two incidents.

The tension of those waiting in that town was felt just over two weeks ago when a group encouraged by false rumors that it could cross into the United States attempted to cross en masse over the border bridge and was blocked by the US authorities.

Sources Proceso, Proceso, La Silla Rota