Yaneli Castillo fled Honduras with her two young children after gang members killed her husband in front of their house and threatened that she would be next.
The 29-year-old arrived in southern Mexico four months ago and filed an asylum claim. She was still waiting for her application to be processed when new threats arrived — text messages from gang members who said they knew where to find her, she said.
“I was trying to do the right thing, and waited and waited with all my papers, and they never helped me,” she said. “So I decided to join the caravan out of fear.”
Castillo is one of several thousand migrants who, desperate for work and fleeing poverty and violence, decided to march out of the border city of Tapachula on Saturday. Mexico’s National Guard forces tried to stop them, but the contingent pushed through. They continued their trek Sunday, hoping to eventually reach Mexico City.
The caravan is made up of Central American migrants, as well as some Haitians, many of whom say they have been stuck in legal limbo, waiting for asylum applications to be processed for as long as a year. Under Mexican law, migrants who file a claim in Tapachula must stay there until their claims are processed.
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Source: MSN
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