Conditions deteriorated in migrant camps near U.S. border in Mexico

Migrants shelter in a makeshift camp near the border with Mexico in Ciudad Acuna, Mexico September 21, 2021. CIUDAD ACUNA, Mexico, Sept 22 Reuters : On Wednesday, conditions deteriorated in migrant camps on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border where thousands of mostly Haitian migrants have gathered, as pressure mounted on President Joe Biden to curb expulsion flights.

Reuters images showed people with small babies and toddlers, one with an untreated hernia on his stomach, under makeshift shelters made of reeds on the banks of the Rio Grande River in Del Rio, Texas.

Clothing was hung to dry and trash was strewn on the ground while parents washed their children using jugs of river water and tried to find patches of shade in the punishing heat. Migrants said food remained scarce and there were not enough portable toilets.

On Wednesday, Mexico and the United States were prepping to fly more Haitian migrants from the camps.

At its peak, as many as 14,000 people were camped out under the international bridge of Del Rio, but U.S. authorities deported thousands of Haitians for immigration processing and moved more than 500 locals until Sunday. The flight deportations to Haiti would continue, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said.

Some Haitians have been allowed into the United States and released from prison according to media reports. The DHS and U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not respond to a request for comment on the releases and did not say how it was determined who would be expelled and who would be released.

On Wednesday morning a trickle of people - mostly men - crossed across the Rio Grande River to Mexico for food, while a line of border patrol cars on the upper banks of the river stood by.

Some of the Mexicans decided to stay on the U.S. side in Ciudad Acuna, across from Del Rio, because of shortages of food and poor conditions on the Mexico side. By Wednesday, around 200 people had set up a handful of camping tents and tarps as shelter.

One family was building a hut out of cardboard boxes. A line formed inside a Doctors Without Borders truck hoping to get medical consultations with one woman worried about her 7 year-old son with a cough.

Politicians from both parties have criticized Biden's handling of the situation.

Authorities ordered an investigation after an incident that occurred over the weekend at border entanglement with angry Mexicans who used reins like whips to intimidate migrants trying to cross the Mississippi River. Photographs and video of the agents on horseback sparked widespread condemnation. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the agents involved had been pulled from frontline duties.

The expulsion flights to Haiti also faced criticism. There is profound instability in the Caribbean nation, the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, where a major assassination, rising gang violence and a rapid earthquake have spread chaos in recent weeks.

Filippo Grandi, the head of the U.N refugee agency, has warned that expulsions to such a volatile situation might violate international law.

Most of the Haitians have not arrived directly from Haiti. Many had previously tried to settle in South America, but recounted difficulties finding work amid pandemic restrictions and the economic downturn.

Some are having second thoughts which they then think.

In Ciudad Acuna, Haitian migrant Maurival Makenson said his older sister was making her way from Colombia to the U.S. border with Mexico, and he was trying to persuade her to turn back.

I tell her it's difficult to get papers, there's deportation, he said.

Some Haitian migrants stepped off flights from Port-au-Prince angrily on Tuesday as they deported Haitian migrants after spending thousands of dollars on arduous voyages.

On Tuesday, after talks with Haitian government representatives, Mexico declared repatriation flights would be offered to those who want to return to their country. At the same time, Mexico began sending migrants away from the border with Guatemala, as well as by bus to its border with the U.S. border in the south. Some 130 Mexican flights to the south of the country sent some 130 people to the Guatemalan town of Villahermosa and another 130 people to the city of Tapachula on the southern Mexican border, a Mexican government official said.

On Tuesday evening, officers from the national migration institute INM entered two small hotels on a small street in Ciudad Acuna and escorted about two dozen migrants, including toddlers, into vans.

One woman, speaking behind a partition, told Reuters she did not know where they were being taken.