Guatemala City, January 30 (RHC)-- According to figures from the Guatemalan Migration Institute (IGM), deportations of women and children from that Central American country trying to reach the United States (U.S.), have increased in the last six years.

According to a local news outlet, "statistics for the last six years from the IGM confirm the trend. In 2018, the United States deported 51,621 Guatemalans, within which there were 5,168 women and 798 minors. These represented 10.01 percent and 1.55 percent of the total, respectively."

While during the pandemic the figures were distorted, in 2023, women and minors represented 46.56 percent of the total repatriations.  IGM data cited by La Hora indicate that it was the year with the highest number of deportations in the country's history.

A total of 55,302 nationals were unable to continue their migratory route, and of these, 13,631 were women and there were 10,404 minors.  However, the information platform warns that the IGM, which records the deportation of these minors, which have increased in eight consecutive years, may not reflect the reality of the migratory phenomenon of this sector of the population,

This is because, they argue, children and adolescents are deported until after a legal process that can take several months or years. For its part, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) noted that 263,863 unaccompanied minors arrived at the U.S. southern border between 2016 and 2023.

In 2016, 18,913 were reported, a figure that increased to 49,478 in 2023, while 2022 saw the highest number of such apprehensions reported, with a total of 60,789.

For her part, the director of a civil society organization on migration issues, Asociación Alianza, Carolina Escobar Sarti, attributed the increase in migration of women and minors to the increase in gang violence, extortion and the lack of economic possibilities and resources.Meanwhile, Otto Rivera, an expert on children and migration issues, said that the increase in migration is due to the levels of poverty and extreme poverty that have increased "terribly" in the country.

"The pandemic deepened the crisis in Guatemala and the social inequalities, as well as increasing violence and making public policies more fragile," said Rivera.

In this sense, in order to make a critical approach to migrations, the Desinformémonos platform specifies the need for "a historical-political positioning that not only understands the structural causes of these processes, but also questions the dynamics of violence, exclusion and marginalization that migrations imply".

It also indicates that "in the context of the development of neoliberal capitalism, we must take into account the genesis of the socioeconomic and political processes that force migrants to leave against their will (such as the increase in inequality, the increase in poverty, violence and insecurity, the precariousness of the material conditions of life)".

Similarly, from Oaxaca, in Mexico, a country that belongs to the migratory route to the USA, Esperanza Pilar Chagoya referred, taking stock of the year 2023, that "due to different situations, this year the migratory flow of Central American people increased and, as they pass through Mexico, various forms of violence to which they are subjected have become visible. It has also become evident that there are no humanitarian migration policies for those who have the need and the right to migrate."