8,000-strong migrant caravan heads for US border

Blinken heading to Mexico to discuss border crisis, as families spent Christmas Day sleeping on scraps of plastic and being fed bananas and sandwiches in southern Mexico

A vast caravan of thousands of migrants is travelling to the US southern border, as Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Mexico to lead a high-level delegation for critical talks on the immigration crisis.

An estimated 8,000-strong group of migrants largely from Venezuela, Cuba and Central America, including many families with young children, crossed the Guatemalan border just before Christmas, according to the Associated Press.

The caravan is believed the largest to set out from Central America in over a year, and comes as a record 10,000 migrants were arrested this month alone at the southwestern border.

The US briefly closed two railway crossings in Texas last week that are crucial to the Mexican economy as border patrol agents were reassigned to cope with the unprecedented surge.

The Aguilar Bastida family, from Venezuela, sit outside the Church of Santa Cruz y La Soledad where migrants camp out i (Associated Press)

Mr Blinken, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas and Homeland Security Advisor Liz Sherwood-Randall will meet with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico City on Wednesday to discuss ways to address border security challenges, according to a State Department statement.

“Their visit will really be about getting at the migratory flows and talking to President López Obrador and his team about what more we can do together,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said last week.

Around 8,000 migrants are making their way towards the southern US border (AP)

Mr López Obrador has said he is willing to help enforce immigration rules at the shared border, but wants to see US remove or reduce sanctions on Cuba and Venezuela, and for the US to contribute more development aid to the region.

“We are going to help, as we always do,” the Mexican president said this week.

Mexico has reportedly offered to negotiate directly with Venezuela and has pushed for increased US spending on youth scholarship and apprentice programmes in Central America.

The migrants mainly come from Venezuela, Cuba and Central America (AP)

The migrants faces a 1,000 mile (1,600km) trek to reach the US border, a feat no previous caravan has managed.

On Christmas Day, entire families spent the night sleeping on scraps of cardboard and plastic in a park, and were fed sandwiches, bananas and water by church groups, according to the Associated Press.

“I was used to my Christmas dinner with the family, not spending it in the street as we did yesterday,” Eduviges Arias, a migrant from Venezuela, told the AP.

Migrant activist and caravan organiser Luis García Villagrán told the AP that Wednesday’s summit would be a meeting “between fools and fools, who want to use women and children as trading pieces”.

“We are not trading pieces for any politician.”

Immigration reform has been deadlocked in Washington DC as Republicans in Congress have sought to tie aid to Ukraine and Israel to tougher border security.