Every day dozens of migrants and refugees set sail for the coast of Mexico in speedboats in the face of pressure on the migratory route by land
Every day dozens of migrants and refugees set sail for the coast of Mexico in speedboats in the face of pressure on the migratory route by land
"Let them pay the 8,000 pesos (400 dollars) and that's it," said the middleman in an audio message on WhatsApp.
"And if they're afraid (...), let them pay you. If not, send them running and it'll be better for you," he says in a second message.
The first conclusion is that, from the tone used, it is clear who is in charge. The second is that there is no bargaining in the human trafficking business. Prices are determined by the middleman. Period.
Every year Mexico 400,000 migrants and refugees, mainly from Central America, with less than 60 dollars in their pockets, who are taking part in a silent exodus towards the United States.
Some of them use the freight train known as La Bestia. However, there are fewer and fewer migrants who risk getting on the train since the Mexican government, in a peculiar humanitarian measure, forced the speed to be increased from 30 to 60 km/h, which increases the risk of suffering a mutilation when trying to jump on the train.
Hundreds of them have found an alternative in the new Bestia from the sea. Boatloads of people pass along the coast of Chiapas every day, heading north.
The dangerous municipality of Ocós, in Guatemala, and the paradise of Mazatán, on the coast of Chiapas, are the epicenters of a migrant industry that leaves Guatemala, passes through the Isthmus of Tehuantepec towards Veracruz and ends up as frightened merchandise in Tamaulipas, on the border with the United States.
"Three or four speedboats leave or pass through here every day, with 15 or 20 pollos [slang for migrants] each one," confirms Gabriel Ortega, a councillor and the right hand of the mayor of Mazatán.
Salvadorans, Hondurans and Guatemalans flee poverty and gang violence along one of the traditional drug trafficking routes using old fishing boats, now with new Yamaha engines.
Sitting in a hammock by the pier in San José, a few kilometers from Mazatán (Chiapas), another middleman, now retired, pauses, adjusts his baseball cap, and recalls that day in 2000 when El Pelón, an acquaintance of his, let 14 people drown in the sea because they didn't want to pay, in one of the biggest tragedies in the region.
"There are a lot of people here who make a living from it and there are already some fishermen in jail," he explains as he swings his net. The toothless fisherman, who for so many years has dedicated himself to transporting immigrants from Central America, says that human trafficking is an alternative to fishing for shellfish or shrimp "because the sea is no longer enough".
Nine months ago, in front of the same pier where he drinks one Victoria beer after another, three children died when a speedboat carrying 20 people capsized.
Although there are no figures for victims or migrants traveling clandestinely at night by sea, it is an increasingly frequent route in the face of pressure on land and the increase in detentions and deportations. Last year, the United States deported 96,000 of these migrants, compared to 147,000 in Mexico, according to official figures.
"The route remained hidden and was used for drug trafficking, but in recent months it has become systematized as a route for transporting people," explains José Luis González, a Jesuit priest who works with refugees in Frontera Comalapa.
For an amount that varies between 400 and 800 dollars - for Cubans it can be double that - this route allows immigrants from Central America to travel from Guatemala to Salina Cruz or Huatulco, in Oaxaca.
This is how they avoid the six toughest migration controls in the country, part of the police belt that the Mexican government has mobilized in the south of the country as part of the Southern Border Plan, partly financed by the United States.
Ocós, Zeta territory
After several intimidating laps on the bike, the young man in a Barcelona shirt finally approaches. "Do you want a speedboat to the north?" he asks. "Look for Mrs. Beti. She'll find a place for you over there," he replies, pointing to a miserable hotel at the end of the street.
Ocós, in Guatemala, where the maritime industry of migrant trafficking begins, is a clean municipality of 40,000 inhabitants in the Department of San Marcos.
It appears to be a pleasant vacation destination with a main street that leads down to a spectacular beach.
It is also one of the Zetas cartel's strategic points of exit for drugs from the Central America and to supply vessels with cocaine from Colombia, one of the world's most important drug trafficking corridors.
The Zetas didn't miss out on one of their most profitable businesses, the human traffickingThey control the entire chain of a route that begins on these beaches.
But no. The proud woman is not easy. She looks at the journalists, gets suspicious and replies again: "I told you, we don't do that".
Three different people sent us to her to make the journey by sea, but she's suspicious. "My brother is a fisherman and doesn't get involved in these things". "And in this hotel I don't even allow anyone who isn't from Mexico or Guatemala to stay," she says, pointing to a sign. But the people in her town think otherwise.
In this dump, migrants from Central America - as well as those known as "exotics", Asians and Africans - wait several days until groups of 15 are formed to undertake the route.
The crossing takes six to eight hours.
In the stern there are two 120-horsepower engines. In the bow, 500 liters of gasoline in gallons, and on the seats, 20 frightened migrants bent over a half-empty tire that could serve as a buoy, crossing the Pacific at night on huge silver waves.
"Ess
we suffer," says the miserable, toothless and unscrupulous middleman, looking at the spot in the water where the three children drowned in June.
The newspapers of that day recall that when the police arrived at the scene, they found a father on his knees, crying next to the bodies of his children. The rest of the crew escaped through a thicket when they set foot on dry land, and made their way to the United States. Poor people trafficked by poor people in southern Chiapas.
Source: El País