MEXICO CITY – Authorities are searching for two migrants who allegedly drowned while trying to cross the Rio Grande at the easternmost end of the border between Mexico and the United States and whose desperation to stay afloat in the mud was recorded in a shocking video that went viral on social media. social.
As reported early Saturday morning by the Tamaulipas state Security spokesperson on its official Facebook account, the migrants are a young Venezuelan and a Haitian, both between 25 and 30 years old.
The authorities indicated that neither of the two has been located but they presume that both died of drowning. The statement does not clarify who is taking charge of searching for them.
On Thursday, a video began to go viral on the networks in which four people are seen in the middle of the mud of the border river, three of them desperately fighting to stay afloat while another appears to be clinging to dry land.
The images show the moment in which one of them ends up sinking without his companions being able to do anything to prevent it and while screams can be heard from the shore.
According to the statement, which cites information collected by the Tamaulipas Institute for Migrants—an official state agency—the Venezuelan was traveling with his wife and two children, who managed to cross into the United States.
“The Venezuelan’s wife and two children managed to cross into the United States, while the alleged victims have not yet been located.”
The young man of Haitian origin was traveling alone and without close family, according to the information offered by his traveling companions and cited in the official report.
The government of Tamaulipas said it is collaborating with Mexican local and state authorities as well as with the US federal authorities and those of Brownsville and Texas to provide all possible information. It was not clear, however, who was leading the search efforts for the victims.
The US Customs and Border Protection Office and the Texas Department of Security, both consulted by The Associated Press, said they had no information on the matter. The Mexican National Immigration Institute also did not respond to a request for comment.
The trickle of deaths of people trying to cross the border river is common because many migrants jump into the water through areas that seem easy to cross but get trapped by branches or are dragged by the current.
The event takes place in the midst of a growing arrival of migrants to the southern border of the United States where this month on some days up to 12,000 irregular crossings were recorded, an unprecedented number.
FOUNTAIN: With information from AFP
