The Guatemalan authorities reported this Friday that the US Government has not submitted a “formal request” to implement regional migrant processing centers in its territory after the end of Title 42.
The communication secretary of the presidency, Kevin Lopezdeclared during a press conference that they are unaware of the operations to attend to asylum seekers in the centers that the United States intends to open in countries like Guatemala.
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#Official announcement 🔴 | Given the expiration of the sanitary measure of the Government of the United States, called “Title 42”, the Government of the President @DrGiammattei informa: pic.twitter.com/FFnicJT06a
— Guatemalan Government (@GuatemalaGob) May 12, 2023
According to López, Guatemala requested the Secretary of National Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, “logistical resources” y “work together” to follow “containing” the regional migration crisis.
“After the end of title 42, a wave of migrants from the region is expected and it will be a challenge for the capacities of the State of Guatemala”Lopez added.
On May 4, the United States announced that it intends to open centers in Latin America to process refugee applications and where migrants must wait until they find out if they apply to obtain asylum in the North American nation.
The measure was announced after Title 42, the health regulation that served the United States to deport more than 2.5 million migrants on the grounds of health reasons, expired on May 11.
Secretary López concluded that under current conditions, Guatemala only has the resources to attend to the normal migratory flow and needs support to face a possible migratory wave.
In the last two days, Mexico warned that a significant increase in the migratory flows of people from Brazil, India, Vietnam and Venezuela in the south of its territory has been reported.
