Across Latin America, families reel from migrant centre fire

The last Ana Marina Lopez heard from her husband, the 51-year-old Guatemalan migrant, told his family he was being held by Mexican immigration agents at the United States-Mexico border.

That was two days before a fire at an immigrant detention center in Ciudad Juarez killed at least 39 migrants and left more than 20 injured.

Then his name appeared on a government list of victims of the fire, but did not specify whether he was among the dead or in hospital. That has led Lopez and her daughter in their small town in western Guatemala to continue to hope that he is still alive.

And they are not the only ones.

As images of the devastating blaze flood news outlets and social media, families across America stagger in agony as they await news of their loved ones.

The pain and uncertainty felt by families underlined how the effects of migration extend far beyond the individuals embarking on the perilous journey northward, touching the lives of people across the region.

In Juarez, Mexico, a sister awaits news of her Venezuelan brother being sedated and intubated in a hospital. In Honduras, families sit dumbfounded after watching videos of guards running from a growing cloud of flames and smoke at the immigrant detention center.

And in Guatemala, Lopez is holding a photo of her husband in a cowboy hat, unsure if he’s alive or dead.

“This shouldn’t be happening. [Migrants] its people, it’s people,” Lopez said in a trembling voice. “What I ask is justice. They are not animals and cannot be treated as such.”

Little is known about the cause of Monday night’s fire and authorities are investigating eight people, including a migrant, who may have started the blaze.

When Lopez’s husband, Bacilio Sutuj Saravia, left for his trip north in mid-March, he told her he was going to Mexico for tourism. Sutuj, who ran a small trucking business with two pickup trucks, waited until he got to Mexico to tell her he was planning to cross over to the US to see their daughter and two sons.

However, he never had the chance. When he got off a bus at Juarez station on Saturday, immigration officers detained him.

Lopez learned of the fire from television news reports. Their children had been unable to reach Sutuj since a brief phone call he made on Saturday saying he had been caught.

“The authorities should be there to watch and care for them, not to run and leave them locked up and burned. That hurts me,” Lopez said.

‘hard blows’

In the rolling, coffee-strewn mountains of western Honduras, the three families, shocked by the surveillance video, await confirmation of the fate of their sons. The three friends had left for the United States together from their small town of Proteccion. Like many in the countryside, the men intended to work and send money back to support their families.

They met a smuggler in San Pedro Sula, a major departure point in northern Honduras, who took them to Mexico.

On Tuesday, the names of the three men – Dikson Aron Cordova, Edin Josue Umana and Jesus Adony Alvarado – were among those who appeared on the government’s victim list without any details on whether they were still alive.

“You want to be strong, but these are hard blows. They are unbearable,” said Jose Cordova Ramos, father of 30-year-old Cordova. “We are waiting for real news that would be the first and the last, as they say, whether they are alive or dead.”

Their concern is matched by anger at watching guards run away from growing flames and thickening smoke quickly encasing migrants.

Another father rambles questions: Who started the fire? How did they get fire there? Did a guard give someone inside a lighter?

“They didn’t want to do anything,” Jose Cordova said of the guards.

In Ciudad Juarez, on the US-Mexico border, 25-year-old Venezuelan nursing student Stefany Arango Morillo has the same pit in her stomach.

She and her brother Stefan Arango Morillo, both single parents, migrated from their northern Venezuelan town of Maracaibo in February, leaving three young children between them and their mother in hopes of seeking asylum in the US.

They joined a rising wave of Venezuelans heading for the US border, crossing seven countries in a month to reach Ciudad Juarez.

Together they tried unsuccessfully every day to sign up for an appointment to apply for asylum in the US via a smartphone app.

But their search came to an abrupt halt on Monday, when Stefan was detained by Mexican immigration authorities and placed behind bars in the detention center that would turn into an inferno hours later.

Stefany desperately searched for her 32-year-old brother and feared the worst when she received a text message from his phone at a private hospital. He was alive, but his smoke inhalation injuries made it nearly impossible for him to speak.

At the hospital, Stefan’s health deteriorated and the aspiring physical education teacher was taken to the hospital’s emergency room with a coughing fit.

Hours later, his sister forced her way into the busy hospital and planted a kiss on her brother’s forehead shortly before he was sedated and intubated. “He’s playful, but also strong-willed,” she said.

In the hospital waiting room, she cried as she called relatives in Venezuela to break the news. But as she waited, she clung to the hope that she could bring him back home.

“This is kind of a life lesson,” Stefany said. “And believe me I know and believe that my brother, that he will get out of there and also continue to fight for our dream.”