Six migrants die, 25 injured in Mexico

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Authorities in northern Mexico said, Wednesday, that six migrants were killed and 25 were injured after a bus they were riding in plunged through a guardrail and down an embankment.

It was the latest in a series of deadly crashes and drownings of migrants, in the last week.

The civil defense office in the northern state of San Luis Potosi said those injured in the bus crash included a six-month-old baby and an eight-year-old child.

The office said that all of the victims “are migrants from Honduras, El Salvador and Cuba.” Prosecutors said the dead were four women and two men, but their nationalities were not immediately clear.

Local media reported the bus had departed from an area near Mexico City and was heading toward the US border. Photos from the scene suggested the bus had flipped onto its side.

The accident occurred on a highway just outside the state capital, also known as San Luis Potosi.

Immigrants activists say crackdowns on migrant crossing have led some to use riskier routes to the US border.

“More people are choosing to take more dangerous routes,” wrote immigrant activist Irineo Mujica. “The number of people who die trying to cross Mexico is rising.”

On Tuesday, authorities in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz said six migrants drowned off Mexico’s Gulf coast and one was still missing. Apparently, all were from Honduras; smugglers sometimes take migrants in open boats across the Gulf to avoid highway immigration checkpoints.

Four migrants, also Hondurans, were pulled alive from the ocean by rescuers after their 25foot open boat apparently capsized off the coast.

In another incident, immigration officials said, this week, that a migrant father and his sevenyear-old son were found dead in the Suchiate River, which marks the border between Mexico and Guatemala.