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Police report finding migrants locked in cargo trailer, while others were found in car and cargo hold of tractor-trailer
Mexican authorities have found at least 600 migrants locked in two refrigerated trailers as they tried to cross into Texas from Mexico.
One of the trailer trucks had one of the migrant men inside. He had been detained by police in southern Veracruz state near the Guatemalan border and was being transported to a migrant shelter when he broke free.
A second truck found in the area did not have any migrants on board.
In total, Mexico’s interior ministry said in a statement the two trucks had 122 people, including 13 minors. Most of the others were women and children. The others were found in a truck pulled over by police and discovered hidden in another truck.
Mexican authorities found 1,836 migrants in nine trucks across southern Mexico on Monday.
About 6,000 Central American migrants who have been at the centre of a US crackdown since they attempted to cross the US border last month are stuck in rural Mexico in the southern city of Tapachula after absconding from shelters in the central state of Chiapas.
President Donald Trump reiterated his call for an immigration crackdown on Monday, saying at a rally in Kansas that Democrats “know if they don’t have the votes for comprehensive immigration reform, they call it deterrence”.
The demonstrations in Tapachula caused a traffic jam in the city, but there was no visible discontent in the plaza, where locals strolled with their families.
Many migrants have attempted to cross into the United States through Mexico’s southern border, despite tightening migration checks along the Rio Grande, the channel through which they flow north.