Russian citizens who fled their country after the invasion of Ukraine and they spent a week in the northern border of Mexicowaiting to be able to enter United Stateswere received in this country after a secret agreement with Mexican officials, the magazine reports today VICE News.
The US outlet, which was able to speak to the Russians before they entered the United States, and said a Mexican federal official with knowledge of the deal and two people familiar with the meetings confirmed the deal, explained that it involved a group of 35 applicants. of asylum, which was transferred before dawn on March 20 to El Chaparral, a pedestrian border checkpoint that was officially closed to the public after a huge camp of Central American and Haitian migrants, among others, concentrated there in 2021. It is currently only used to prosecute people the United States deports to Mexico.
Once there, Mexican officials turned the Russians over to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) American.
Under Title 42, which entered into force in March 2020, migrants who arrive in the United States from Mexico and Canada can be expressly expelled from the country and, if they request asylum, they must wait for their processes on the Mexican side, using as argument the pandemic Covid-19.
The Russians had been at the border for a week when they were allowed to cross into the United States, when other migrants must wait months while they are called to their hearings.
“I got here on Monday [14 de marzo]and the Mexican authorities went out of their way to help us, offering us warm clothing, food, water, hot tea and power banks,” he said. Mikhail Shliachkov, from north of Moscow, speaking to VICE News, before crossing into the United States. “On Tuesday they started asking us to go to a shelter. But we don’t want to leave the streets because we are afraid. Now, they ask us every day to go somewhere else.”
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At the end of the week of March 14, according to the outlet, the US consul in Tijuana, Thomas E. Reott, met with representatives of the Russian camp in the presence of Mexican officials from the office of the governor of Tijuana. Lower California. The Mexican official told VICE News that on Friday, March 18, the consul told the group’s representatives that they would be allowed to cross into the United States in three or four days if they vacated the camp, but that the Russians refused, considering it to be too much time.
On Saturday, March 19, Baja California government officials informed the group that the crossing would take place at 5 am the following day, and the Russians accepted the offer.
In official vehicles of the National Migration Institute (INM) from Mexico, were transferred to a hotel and from there to El Chaparral. In addition to the 35, some Russians who were not at the camp but who VICE News believes were staying in hotels in Tijuana joined the group.
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Already on the US side, on Sunday, CBP agents took them into custody and kept them there for two days. The families were released in San Diego with a warning that they will have to appear before immigration judges to hear their asylum applications. The Russians who were traveling alone were transferred to migrant detention centers and it is not known when they will be released.
The report shows how immigration rules are not applying the same for everyone. VICE News consulted the US Department of State, which without confirming the agreement brokered by the consul, noted that the United States and Mexico “cooperate closely on a wide range of issues, including migration.” The INM declined to comment.
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