Mexico Migrant Fire: Venezuelans Stranded After Tragedy

Many Venezuelans are stranded in Mexico after a deadly fire at a migrant detention center in Ciudad Juárez last month.

If one has to cross the lawless Darién Gap, it takes at least 10 days on foot and is very grueling. One has to go through the dangerous Panamanian jungle as part of the journey.

But The Guardian reported that it's easier than being stuck at the U.S.-Mexico border, said people who managed to avoid the fatal fire at the detention center.

Loidermar Barrios, who is from Maracay, Venezuela, said that it's because of "immigration authorities, they've made our lives impossible."

The 27-year-old added that her four-year-old daughter told her she wants to return to the jungle.

Last Thursday morning, Barrios, her husband Edgar Naranjo and their two kids reached the immigration processing center where a fire killed nearly 40 migrants in Juárez. It is the large Mexican sister city of El Paso, Texas, across the US border.

They wanted to know if a missing family member was among those who died. They wanted to inform their relatives back home.

Naranjo said that the authorities don't even send them back alive, and if his family member is dead, "getting his body to Venezuela will be very complicated."

According to MSNBC, the Mexican government has issued six arrest warrants on charges of "intentional homicide."

It included three officials from Mexico's National Migration Institute. It is the agency that runs the facility that for the most part is a detention center for migrants who wait to claim asylum in the U.S.

Previously, a video had emerged that showed the moment when the fire started at the center, reported BBC.

Men in uniform seemed to walk away while the fire erupted in a corner. They left behind a group of men in a cell that appeared to be locked.

Last Monday, immigration authorities raided intersections throughout the city. They detained migrants who were cleaning the windshields of vehicles and asking for money in the streets.

Those migrants became the fire victims, with some from Guatemala, Venezuela, El Salvador, and Honduras.

Naranjo said that the mayor had been sending "xenophobic messages to the migrant population," and that his "rhetoric prompted these raids."

Cruz Pérez Cuéllar, who is the mayor of Ciudad Juárez, slammed protesting migrants. Last month, they temporarily interrupted the flow of traffic at the Paso del Norte International Bridge that leads to America.

He denied responsibility for the fatal fire and insisted that what happened in the streets had nothing to do with the blaze.