El Paso, September 23 (RHC)-- A Honduran mother and her 21-month-old toddler died last week while trying to cross the Rio Grande into the United States to apply for asylum. 

Idalia Herrera and her son, Iker Cordova, had recently entered the United States to apply for asylum, but they were forced to wait in the border city of Matamoros, Mexico, for their immigration hearing as part of Trump’s contested “Remain in Mexico” policy. 

CNN reports that Herrera grew desperate as weeks passed and her day in court never came.  She tried to cross the Rio Grande but was swept away by the river currents.

Meanwhile, the U.S. and El Salvador have signed a new deal that would force migrants passing through El Salvador to seek asylum there rather than in the U.S. — and could also return asylum seekers back to El Salvador once they reach the United States.

Amnesty International said in a statement: “El Salvador has one of the highest rates of violence in the world, including gender-based violence so rampant that Amnesty International declared it one of the most dangerous countries in the world to be a woman.  It is not safe for its own citizens, much less for asylum-seekers.”