Between Sunday and Monday this week, Guatemalan authorities repelled some 7,000 Central American migrants, most of whom are said to be Honduran. The migrant caravan, one of several that have travelled through Central America to get to the US border with Mexico in recent times in the hope of finding asylum in America, was designated an “illegal mass movement” by the Guatemalan government and pushed back with tear gas and batons by security forces. A BBC report said that while some people fled to the nearby mountains, others remained nearby possibly in the hope of making another attempt to get past the security forces. News photos and videos of the scene showed the mass of desperate men, women and children, many of whom were not wearing masks, clashing with security forces in riot gear before retreating.
Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, referred to as Central America’s Northern Triangle, are said to be the poorest countries in that part of the world. They are plagued by murders and other crimes, illegal drugs and gang violence; face food insecurity and other economic hardships; and there is unequal access to basic services, like potable water.
In 2019, the Trump administration cut and froze some US$400 million in aid to the Northern Triangle in a move aimed at forcing those governments to stem the flow of their countries’ citizens to the US. The cuts devastated the poorest of the poor and then came the COVID-19 pandemic, making already miserable lives that much worse.
Last November, a severe tropical storm hit Central America, making landfall in Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, parts of Mexico, parts of Belize, El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Panama, also reaching parts of Colombia. Less than two weeks later, before they could exhale from the passing of that storm a major hurricane, Iota, struck. Flooding and landslides damaged or destroyed homes, crops, and infrastructure in these same countries some of which are already vulnerable to cyclical drought and flooding.
Faced with utter desolation, but perhaps comforted by the fact that the migration-resistant Trump administration was on its way out, bands of people began an exodus north in search of salvation. However, even if they manage to get past the Guatemalan authorities, they are unlikely to find it anytime soon. They would have to join a line of already over 20,000 of their countrymen and women waiting in Mexico for an opportunity to enter the US, which to date remains the country in the world with the highest rates of COVID-19 infections (close to 25 million as of Monday) and deaths (topping 408,000). Aside from having to quickly get a handle on COVID-19, there is much that has to be addressed in a deeply divided America by the Biden administration before it turns its attention to refugees and asylum seekers.
In fact, in many places in the world, even where migration is needed and encouraged it has been placed on the backburner owing to the coronavirus pandemic. In Canada, for example, it was reported that the population growth rate in the third quarter of last year was the slowest ever recorded since such data compilation began in 1946. This was mainly as a result of travel restrictions imposed because of the pandemic, and despite the country continuing to process permanent residence applications and welcome skilled immigrants.
While COVID-19 restricted movement, it did not really affect the reasons many people migrate and, in some cases, exacerbated those reasons. The result is that millions of migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers are in limbo. Aside from those who have left for economic reasons, people are fleeing ongoing wars. Conflicts raging in Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Turkey, Somalia, Libya and other countries in North Africa, as well as Iraq and as recent as last year Ethiopia, have displaced millions of people; not to mention the drug war in Mexico, and state abuses and persecution in the Philippines, Venezuela and other places that have led to humanitarian crises. People cannot return to their homes, in most instances they have no physical homes left to return to, nor can they continue on to the countries they had hoped would take them in.
A report published by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs this month, estimated that the pandemic slowed migration flows by around 2 million people last year. That figure might be limited to what is now termed legal migration. Undoubtedly, the numbers will rise again after coronavirus infections have been controlled globally.
The movement of people around the globe, whether voluntarily or forcibly, has been occurring ad infinitum and was crucial to the founding and building of many countries, the US being one of them. Xenophobia, racism, discrimination and other abhorrent barriers are unlikely to end this movement. The UN believes that it should be better managed as outlined in its Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, which was endorsed by the General Assembly in December 2018.
The truth is that if our countries, and by extension the world, are to achieve true peace and safety, then the plight of the displaced, the persecuted, the poor has to be addressed. The survival instinct that exists in all of us means that people will go, or stay, where they believe they stand a better chance of living and achieving quality of life. It really is that simple.