Witness for Peace Midwest proclaims our wholehearted solidarity with the caravan of migrants currently moving through Guatemala from Honduras towards Mexico and the US. We’d like to echo the sentiments expressed in our last statement of solidarity with the migrant caravan in April as they directly apply to the current situation.
We continue to support those who exercise their right to seek asylum, acknowledging that the widespread violence perpetrated by state security forces and organized crime are exacerbated by U.S. policies that promote exploitation and militarization in Honduras.
We are extremely concerned by Trump’s tweets demanding that the Honduran government stop people fleeing from said government by any means necessary. The US already has a poor record of holding Honduras responsible for its state-sponsored crimes against humanity, and in fact, continues to support the government despite internationally-documented human rights violations.
Once again, Trump shows his support for the United States’ typical counterproductive approach to mass migration – bolstering militarization, which only creates more push factors to flee, contributing to this dismal spiral of violence and suffering.
This time, he is invoking the notion that violence at any border is justified to forcibly return people to the countries from which they are fleeing, with dangerous conditions that the US helped create. We call upon the international community, nonprofits and politicians alike, to follow updates on the caravan carefully. Migrants not only face extortion and assaults along the way, but must also traverse criminalization and violence from police that the US funds.
From country conditions in the Northern Triangle, to the various borders on the path northward, the US is intimately involved in every aspect of why this caravan is happening. As US citizens, we must keep our eyes on this caravan and hold our government responsible.