MATIAS ROMERO, Mexico (Reuters) - Mexican officials on Tuesday screened a dwindling group of hundreds of largely Central American migrants who are moving through Mexico toward the United States, seeking to break up the “caravan” that has drawn the ire of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump, doubling down on his tough stance against illegal immigration, has railed against those making their way from the Guatemala-Mexico border in the past 10 days.

Trump repeated threats to torpedo the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which underpins much of Mexico’s foreign trade, and said he wanted to send troops to the U.S. border to stop illegal immigrants until a long-promised border wall is built.

In response, the Mexican government has said the migrants are being vetted to determine whether they have a right to stay, or would be returned to their countries of origin.

Hundreds of men, women and children from Central America were stuck on Tuesday in the town of Matias Romero in the poor southern Mexican state of Oaxaca awaiting clarification of their legal status after officials began registering them.

Confused and frustrated by paperwork, many were uncertain what lay in store, and desperate for information.

“What was the point of all this then if they don’t let us stay?” Elizabeth Avalos, 23, a migrant from El Salvador who was traveling with two children, said angrily. “There’s no food, my children haven’t eaten since yesterday.”

Hundreds of people camped out overnight in a park near the town’s train station, with shoes and bags strewn about.

Jaime Alexander Variega, 35, sat alone in a patch of shade and cupped his head in his hands, weeping or praying, his feet still bearing lacerations from walking for four or five days straight through Guatemala from El Salvador.

“We’re not safe in El Salvador,” said the former security guard, his hat smeared in dirt, explaining he had left his home because of the threats from local gangs. “I know it’s difficult to get into the United States. But it’s not impossible.”

Around them, Mexican migration officials with notepads and pens took basic information from the migrants, asking for names, nationalities, dates of birth and proof of identity.

Central American migrants take a break from traveling in their caravan, as they journey to the U.S., in Matias Romero, Oaxaca, Mexico April 3, 2018. REUTERS/Henry Romero

The caravan was organized by U.S-based advocacy group Pueblo Sin Fronteras, which seeks to draw attention to the rights of migrants and provide them with aid. The Mexican government says the caravan, which like others travels by road, rail and on foot, has been organized every year since 2010.

Honduran Carlos Ricardo Ellis Garcia clutched a handwritten list of names belonging to more than 100 people who joined the caravan in the southern border town of Tapachula, where it began on March 25, reaching a peak of around 1,500 people.

But by Tuesday the number was down to about 1,100, according to Pueblo Sin Fronteras spokeswoman Gina Garibo.

Many had broken off from the group, eager to move on more quickly, she said. Many others aimed to stay in Mexico because they had family ties there or planned to work, Garibo said.

“Now they’re separating these groups,” Ellis Garcia said, referring to an estimated 300 people who split from the caravan on Monday. “I don’t know what’s the deal, we have no answers.”

Advocacy groups told Reuters dozens of people left the caravan and traveled to the crime-ridden eastern state of Veracruz, where they were met by migration officials and police.

The government said on Monday evening around 400 people in the caravan had already been sent back to their home countries.

Geronimo Gutierrez, Mexico’s ambassador to the United States, told CNN that Mexican authorities were “looking at the status of the individuals so we can proceed either with a repatriation process” or offer humanitarian relief. That could include granting asylum or humanitarian visas.

Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala are among the most violent and impoverished countries in the Americas, prompting many people to leave in search of a better life.

Trump, who ran for office in 2016 on a platform to stem illegal immigrants from Mexico, said he had “told Mexico” he hoped it would halt the caravan.

The migrant caravan also poses a political problem for Mexico’s unpopular government in a presidential election year.

Slideshow (7 Images)

President Enrique Pena Nieto is barred by law from seeking re-election in the July 1 vote, but the ruling party candidate is running third, well behind the front-runner.

The government does not want to be seen as kowtowing to threats by Trump, who is deeply unpopular in Mexico.

In a country where millions of people have friends or relatives who have migrated legally or illegally to the United States, many Mexicans harbor sympathy for the Central Americans.</s>MATIAS ROMERO, Mexico (Reuters) - Central American migrants stranded on a journey through Mexico because of U.S. President Donald Trump’s pressure on the Mexican government say they will struggle on toward the United States, even as their “caravan” said it would disband in Mexico City.

Fearful of the risks to children among the bedraggled and tired knot of travelers, the organizers of the annual caravan, U.S.-based advocacy group Pueblo Sin Fronteras, said it would end in the capital, not at the border as had been planned.

“It’s not because of Donald Trump,” said Irineo Mujica, director of Pueblo Sin Fronteras, which has staged the caravan since 2010 to draw attention to migrants’ rights and help them.

Mujica said the group did not want to put children on freight trains, which are traditionally used to cover part of the journey to the border. Nicknamed “la bestia” (the beast), the train is infamous for causing injury to migrants.

Trump has lashed out at the caravan, accusing Mexico of failing to stop illegal immigrants heading to the border.

The president took a hard line on illegal immigration during the 2016 election campaign and is frustrated by the failure of Congress to fund his long-promised border wall.

Trump would sign a proclamation on Wednesday ordering the deployment of the National Guard to the border with Mexico, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said.

Mexican officials, meanwhile, have screened people in the caravan, stalling it and dispersing migrants. The foreign ministry denied putting pressure on the migrants, saying that the caravan was breaking up of its own volition.

By mid-afternoon on Wednesday in the southern town of Matias Romero, migrants were sprawled in the fields singing songs or tying to sleep off the searing sun.

Sitting in the dust was a seven-year-old boy who removed his dirty flip-flops and splayed his feet, revealing flaking and blackened cracks between his toes from days of walking with his mother and sister from El Salvador.

A number of the children in the caravan were suffering from diarrhea, vomiting, respiratory problems and dehydration, said a local doctor, Julio Cesar Iglesias.

Some migrants may get permits to stay, while others will be sent back to their home countries, the Mexican government says.

Hundreds of the migrants, many from Honduras, marched in Matias Romero on Tuesday evening to draw attention to their plight near the field where they have been bivouacked since the weekend.

There were shouts to oust Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, whose disputed re-election victory in a November vote split the country.

International observers criticized the result due to serious concerns over vote-rigging, though Mexico and the Trump administration recognized it a few weeks later. Some migrants in the caravan saw no future for themselves in Honduras.

One of them, Maria Elena Colindres Ortega, an opponent of Hernandez and former member of the Honduran congress who is seeking U.S. political asylum, said the march on Tuesday aimed to show the migrants were not giving up.

“We’re marching and moving to prove to (Trump) that we are not afraid,” said Colindres Ortega, a mother of seven.

Migration officials on Wednesday continued to register names and issue permits to some migrants that give them 20 days to leave Mexico - a far shorter period than the caravan has taken to reach the U.S. border in previous years, organizers said.

The organizers said that on Sunday about 300 migrants, most of them men, left the group, and headed to the eastern state of Veracruz. There, according to three witnesses, four truckloads of immigration officials gave them 48 hours to disperse.</s>(AP Photo/Felix Marquez). A Salvadoran girl waves her national flag as Central American migrants traveling with the annual Stations of the Cross caravan march to call for migrants' rights and protest the policies of U.S. President Donald Trump and Hond...

(AP Photo/Felix Marquez). Central American migrants participating in the Migrant Stations of the Cross caravan or "Via crucis," set up camp at a sports center during the caravan's few-day's stop in Matias Romero, Oaxaca state, Mexico, late Monday, Apri...

(AP Photo/Felix Marquez). A child plays in an abandoned pool as the adults sleep, at a sports club where Central American migrants traveling with the annual "Stations of the Cross" caravan are camped out, in Matias Romero, Oaxaca State, Mexico, Tuesday...

(AP Photo/Felix Marquez). A Honduran man carries a sleeping girl, as Central American migrants traveling with the annual Stations of the Cross caravan march for migrants' rights and protest the policies of U.S. President Donald Trump and Honduran Presi...

(AP Photo/Felix Marquez). Central American migrants traveling with the annual Stations of the Cross caravan march to call for migrants' rights and protest the policies of U.S. President Donald Trump and Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, in Mat...

MATIAS ROMERO, Mexico (AP) - The Mexican government began handing out transit or humanitarian visas to people in a caravan of Central American migrants, and said the procession of 1,000 or so migrants that drew criticism from President Donald Trump had begun to disperse.

Some migrants who awoke at the camp Wednesday said they would try their luck at requesting asylum in the United States, others in Mexico.

Elmer Gomez, 38, from eastern El Salvador, has been sleeping with his wife and three children aged 7, 13 and 14 on the soccer field under blankets as they wait for temporary transit visas from Mexico to continue to the US border. He hopes to request asylum and join relatives in New York.

"We didn't leave our countries just because we wanted to," Gomez said. "It's for the safety of our children."

Like many, he had joined the caravan - which was never expected to be so big, and never planned to go all the way to the border - because there was safety in numbers.

Now, the family faces the prospect of travelling solo; the caravan is scheduled to make its last stops this week at a migrants rights symposium in the central city of Puebla, and end in Mexico City.

"It seems a little complicated, with the robberies, kidnappings, and all of that," Gomez said. "It's a little scary, to travel without the caravan."

Organizer Irineo Mujica said, "We will try to find a better way of doing our caravans" in coming years. "We didn't anticipate, or want, a caravan of this size."

The caravan is an annual, symbolic event held around Easter each year to raise awareness about the plight of migrants and has never left southern Mexico, though some participants then continue north on their own.

Trump's strong criticism of the caravan and Mexico's supposed permissiveness in allowing it to proceed, have confused and befuddled families here, who deny they are a threat. Many say they never intended on going all the way to the United States after the end of the "Stations of the Cross" caravan. Some are seeking asylum in Mexico itself.

Even coordinators of the caravan seemed to misunderstand the debate in the U.S. when Trump's endorsed a "nuclear option" for pushing funding for his border wall through Congress. They told worried families Tuesday that the U.S. president had floated the idea of using a nuclear weapon against the caravan of mostly women and children who have fled violence in Central America.

The Mexican government said in a statement late Tuesday that its immigration policy "is not subject to pressure," but noted the caravan "began to disperse by decision of the participants."

It said 465 migrants had asked for transit visas and 230 had gotten them, and another 168 were likely to get some sort of visa to stay in Mexico.

Though the caravan is uncomfortable - the migrants cook meager, donated rations on fires and sleep under the stars - they said risks they have taken should be an indication of how unsustainable their circumstances are back home. Hondurans predominate in this year's caravan, but it includes families from Guatemala and El Salvador as well.

Sitting on a thin foam pad and trying to corral her sons, 2-year-old Jonathan and 6-year-old Omar, Gabriela Hernandez wondered aloud at what Trump must think of them.

"I see it as something really sad, because I don't understand how a child this age can make things difficult for him," said Hernandez, a 27-year-old who is two months pregnant.

She would like to get into the U.S., where she has a cousin in Houston. Crime in Honduras was so bad that she decided to embark on the difficult a journey across several international borders with two young asthmatic sons, the younger of whom is now sick and on antibiotics.

Late Tuesday, the first migrants began receiving documents from Mexican immigration authorities. Some give them 20 days to transit the country on their way to the U.S. border with the stated goal of applying for asylum. Others got papers in a first step toward a humanitarian Mexican residency visa for especially vulnerable people or a start to the application process for asylum in Mexico.

Mayra Zepeda, 38, of Honduras, said that once she gets documents to cross Mexico, she and her husband will continue their journey toward the border city of Tijuana. She said they hope to find better paying jobs there and aren't planning to try to cross into the U.S.

The couple left Honduras in December after incumbent President Juan Orlando Hernandez was declared the winner of a contested election. The factory where she made T-shirts for export closed due to the weeks of instability that followed the election, she said.

She and her family stopped in the Mexican town of Tapachula at the Guatemala border for three months and she worked in a restaurant. When the caravan came together there they saw it as a good opportunity to make a move with safety in numbers.

On Tuesday afternoon, she cooked a cauldron full of sliced squash and eggs over an open fire for the caravan's security team, volunteers who keep an eye on things.

"Honestly, I want to be Mexican," Zepeda said. "We're not going to cross. We're just going to stay here."

Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</s>As everyone knows, a “caravan” of more than 1,000 Hondurans is making its way North through Mexico toward the United States. This caravan had sought, and drawn, a great deal of publicity before President Trump began talking about it. He tweeted:

Weirdly, the liberal media pretended to have no idea what the President was talking about. Politifact purported to fact-check “Trump’s fresh statement that ‘caravans’ are coming our way, presumably from south of the Texas-Mexico border.” But the only question there is the plural; there is no doubt that a Honduran caravan is on its way.

Which Politifact eventually gets around to admitting, after some faux confusion.

CNN reported April 1, 2018: “Trump appears to be referring to a migrant caravan assembled by the group Pueblo Sin Fronteras (People without Borders), which was discussed on Fox News’ ‘Fox & Friends’ shortly before he published his tweet. It’s not known if the President watched the specific segment, but he indirectly referenced claims mentioned in an on-air interview with a Border Patrol union representative.” Similarly, a news story in The Washington Post pointed to the described caravan as the likely basis of Trump’s concern.

Politifact finally concedes that what Trump said was true, but inconsistent with Democratic Party narratives. (That’s my paraphrase.):

President Trump tweeted that caravans of immigrants are coming to the Mexico-U.S. border. We confirmed that a caravan of 1,200 to 1,500 people from Central America–not caravans–was in southern Mexico, about 900 miles from the Rio Grande, when Trump tweeted. Also, accounts vary on whether all participants are bound to enter the U.S. An organizer estimated that most of the people intend to remain in Mexico. On balance, we rate this claim Half True.

Politifact linked to the Associated Press’s similarly angst-ridden “fact check.” The AP writes:

THE FACTS: Trump is painting an overly ominous picture of the procession of some 1,100 migrants, many from Honduras, who have been marching in a caravan along roadsides and train tracks in the southern Mexico state of Oaxaca. They are not marching en masse to the U.S. border to sneak in. These “Stations of the Cross” migrant caravans have been held in southern Mexico for at least the last five years. They began as short processions of migrants, some dressed in biblical garb and carrying crosses, as an Easter-season protest against the kidnappings, extortion, beatings and killings suffered by many Central American migrants as they cross Mexico. The organized portions of the caravans usually don’t proceed much farther north than the Gulf coast state of Veracruz; migrants as individuals or in smaller groups often take buses or trucks from there to the border. The current march is scheduled to wind up this month with a conference on migration issues in the central Mexican state of Puebla, east of Mexico City. That’s some 650 miles by road (1,050 km) from the U.S. Migrants who break away and reach the U.S. border often turn themselves in and request asylum.

In other words: Trump is crazy to think that these people are coming to the U.S.

Oddly, neither the AP nor Politifact shows any sign of having read the press release issued by the caravan’s leaders, which explains what it is all about. The caravan’s leaders make “demands” on “our Central American countries” and “Mexico and the United States.” These Central Americans can make demands on their own governments, for whatever good that may do. But what standing do they have to make demands on the United States or Mexico? None.

These are the “caravan’s” demands:

There you have it. These leftists demand open borders because as Hondurans, they are just as much citizens of the U.S. as we are. This is simply a false statement of fact. But it nevertheless represents a political agenda. These would-be migrants and their supporters in the U.S.–who, unfortunately, are plentiful–don’t believe in sovereignty. They don’t believe in borders. They don’t believe in citizenship. They don’t believe in countries. Most particularly, they don’t believe in ours, notwithstanding the fact that some of them, at least, want to come here.

So the caravan represents a direct, if symbolic, challenge to our sovereignty and our right to govern ourselves as a free people. President Trump understands this, while Politifact and the Associated Press do not. Or, perhaps, they do understand but pretend not to.

In a press conference today, President Trump vowed to send troops to the Southern border, if necessary. Apparently U.S. immigration law is so lame that any of the caravaners who make it to the U.S. as part of a family, and ask for refugee status, must be admitted–and probably lost forever–into the interior of the country. There, they will join millions of other illegal immigrants, living mostly in “sanctuary” cities or states, likely subject to meaningless deportation orders. The Democrats and their press minions see nothing problematic about this. But the rest of us do.</s>MATIAS ROMERO, Mexico >> The Mexican government began handing out transit or humanitarian visas to people in a caravan of Central American migrants, and said the procession of 1,000 or so migrants that drew criticism from President Donald Trump had begun to disperse.

Some migrants who awoke at the camp Wednesday said they would try their luck at requesting asylum in the United States, others in Mexico.

Elmer Zelaya Gomez, 38, from eastern El Salvador, has been sleeping with his wife and three children aged 7, 13 and 14 on the soccer field under blankets as they wait for temporary transit visas from Mexico to continue to the US border. He hopes to request asylum and join relatives in New York.

“We didn’t leave our countries just because we wanted to,” Zelaya Gomez said. “It’s for the safety of our children.”

Like many, he had joined the caravan — which was never expected to be so big, and never planned to go all the way to the border — because there was safety in numbers.

Now, the family faces the prospect of travelling solo; the caravan is scheduled to make its last stops this week at a migrants rights symposium in the central city of Puebla, and end in Mexico City.

“It seems a little complicated, with the robberies, kidnappings, and all of that,” Zelaya Gomez said. “It’s a little scary, to travel without the caravan.”

Organizer Irineo Mujica said, “We will try to find a better way of doing our caravans” in coming years. “We didn’t anticipate, or want, a caravan of this size.”

The caravan is an annual, symbolic event held around Easter each year to raise awareness about the plight of migrants and has never left southern Mexico, though some participants then continue north on their own.

Trump’s strong criticism of the caravan and Mexico’s supposed permissiveness in allowing it to proceed, have confused and befuddled families here, who deny they are a threat. Many say they never intended on going all the way to the United States after the end of the “Stations of the Cross” caravan. Some are seeking asylum in Mexico itself.

Even coordinators of the caravan seemed to misunderstand the debate in the U.S. when Trump’s endorsed a “nuclear option” for pushing funding for his border wall through Congress. They told worried families Tuesday that the U.S. president had floated the idea of using a nuclear weapon against the caravan of mostly women and children who have fled violence in Central America.

The Mexican government said in a statement late Tuesday that its immigration policy “is not subject to pressure,” but noted the caravan “began to disperse by decision of the participants.”

It said 465 migrants had asked for transit visas and 230 had gotten them, and another 168 were likely to get some sort of visa to stay in Mexico.

Though the caravan is uncomfortable — the migrants cook meager, donated rations on fires and sleep under the stars — they said risks they have taken should be an indication of how unsustainable their circumstances are back home. Hondurans predominate in this year’s caravan, but it includes families from Guatemala and El Salvador as well.

Sitting on a thin foam pad and trying to corral her sons, 2-year-old Jonathan and 6-year-old Omar, Gabriela Hernandez wondered aloud at what Trump must think of them.

“I see it as something really sad, because I don’t understand how a child this age can make things difficult for him,” said Hernandez, a 27-year-old who is two months pregnant.

She would like to get into the U.S., where she has a cousin in Houston. Crime in Honduras was so bad that she decided to embark on the difficult a journey across several international borders with two young asthmatic sons, the younger of whom is now sick and on antibiotics.

Late Tuesday, the first migrants began receiving documents from Mexican immigration authorities. Some give them 20 days to transit the country on their way to the U.S. border with the stated goal of applying for asylum. Others got papers in a first step toward a humanitarian Mexican residency visa for especially vulnerable people or a start to the application process for asylum in Mexico.

Mayra Zepeda, 38, of Honduras, said that once she gets documents to cross Mexico, she and her husband will continue their journey toward the border city of Tijuana. She said they hope to find better paying jobs there and aren’t planning to try to cross into the U.S.

The couple left Honduras in December after incumbent President Juan Orlando Hernandez was declared the winner of a contested election. The factory where she made T-shirts for export closed due to the weeks of instability that followed the election, she said.

She and her family stopped in the Mexican town of Tapachula at the Guatemala border for three months and she worked in a restaurant. When the caravan came together there they saw it as a good opportunity to make a move with safety in numbers.

On Tuesday afternoon, she cooked a cauldron full of sliced squash and eggs over an open fire for the caravan’s security team, volunteers who keep an eye on things.

“Honestly, I want to be Mexican,” Zepeda said. “We’re not going to cross. We’re just going to stay here.”</s>Puebla, Mexico (CNN) The caravan of Central American migrants going through Mexico to the US border isn't ending. Instead, its participants will disperse into smaller groups after reaching Mexico City.

While some will stay in Mexico to try to get refugee status there, others will continue north to the US border.

Organizers of the caravan estimate that some 200 or so people will proceed all the way to the US border in the coming days, although the number could be higher. Last year, about 150 went all the way to the border, they said.

Pueblo Sin Fronteras caravan or People Without Borders has organized the event for years. The caravan has always dispersed into separate, smaller groups at some point along the journey. What has been striking is that this year's event has the largest number of people ever, with more than 1,100.

The images of the throngs of migrants making their way north caught the attention of President Donald Trump this week, who has fumed about the caravan and what he calls weak border laws in the US. He signed a memorandum to deploy the National Guard to the southwest border on Wednesday.

Who are the migrants?

Regardless of what Trump says or does, many migrants in the caravan said they won't be deterred from heading to the US border.

Lilian Mejia is one of them and determined to get to Texas.

She left El Salvador to join the caravan and said she heard on the news that Trump is mad because of them.

"He's not poor, fighting for his family," Mejia, 25, said. "This is what he doesn't understand."

She wears a tight bun and carries a black bag containing everything she plans to take on the 2,400-mile journey from Chiapas to the US border. All she has is a purple hoodie, a second pair of sneakers and an extra pair of clothes.

She and her husband left their two sons, a 3-year-old and a 9-year-old, behind to look for work.

"I'm looking for a better life for my kids. Arrive, the goal is to arrive [in the US], work and send money to my children," Mejia said, adding there's almost no work in El Salvador and a lot of gang violence there.

She joined the caravan "because it makes things easier to make it through immigration. It seems the right way, less dangerous."

For now, she stays at a church in Puebla where other exhausted migrants lay on thin blankets, resting in a bare room adorned with a simple cross. Many churches have opened their doors to migrants as most of the people in the caravan are expected to arrive in the city Thursday. From Puebla, the caravan will continue to Mexico City.

'Dangerous' to go to US

But not everyone in the caravan seeks to go to the US.

Eric Sagastume from Guatemala, says the risks are too great for him to attempt to enter the US again. He was deported 13 years ago.

When asked why he doesn't want to go all the way to the US border, Sagastume, 61, shook his head slowly and folded his glasses.

"It's a bad place for Central American people, Mexican people," he replied. "United States have a bad, bad president. This is dangerous."

He wants to remain in Mexico as its government may offer some people permission to stay on humanitarian grounds.

Sagastume would like to go to Cabo San Lucas, a popular resort city, where he could use his English skills and meet people. He wants to make some money and support his family in Guatemala.

After walking more than a week with the caravan, Sagastume is tired and weathered from the sun. But he says that people in the caravan take care of each other and share what little they have.

He remains upbeat and carries his faith -- a white, tattered Bible tucked in his pack that has traveled with him for hundreds of miles.</s>Mexico's ambassador to the United States, Gerónimo Gutiérrez, says that the Mexican government has been working to "manage migration flows" — despite President Trump's tweets accusing the country of doing "very little, if not NOTHING," to stop crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Gutiérrez says that a caravan of U.S.-bound Central American migrants, also the target of the president's ire in recent days, is reducing in numbers and likely to wrap up soon.

The ambassador spoke to NPR's All Things Considered on Tuesday, days after Trump began a series of tweets about the caravan.

As we have previously reported, the president's remarks "include some debatable claims about DACA, border security, and immigration law and policy on both sides of the Southern border."

NPR's Mexico correspondent, Carrie Kahn, explains that the caravan is an annual event organized by activists, designed to keep migrants safe and share information about their rights. The migrants traveled to Mexico separately, largely from Honduras, before meeting up to travel together.

The caravan is not a new phenomenon, but the attention this caravan is receiving is unusual. Meanwhile, the number of crossings across the border between Mexico and the U.S. has dropped significantly, recently hitting the lowest level in decades. And a growing number of Central Americans are requesting asylum in Mexico, instead of seeking to enter the U.S.

Mexico has pushed back on Trump's assertions that the country is not acting to stem the flow of migrants across the border.

Officials say the country works closely with the U.S. on migration and security, and has already deported hundreds of unauthorized immigrants in the caravan, and plans to review the status of others.

Ambassador Gutiérrez called it a "daunting task" to address immigration "not only between Mexico and the U.S., but regionally. ... People don't often realize that, but the vast majority of people that arrive to the U.S.-Mexico border are no longer Mexicans, they are Central Americans."

As for the suddenly high-profile caravan of migrants, the event "is largely intended to highlight migrants' rights in Mexico," he says. "We have been in contact with the U.S. Embassy since March 25 regarding this situation.

"We're trying to find the best ways to manage migration flows in a way that it's respectful both to the laws of the United States and Mexico, and we have seen the numbers of people in the caravan by their own will drastically reduce," Gutiérrez says.

"The Mexican government has proceeded when appropriate with repatriations. And ... it has offered also when appropriate humanitarian relief to its members.

"It's not unlikely that you will see that in the next few days the caravan concludes — I would say even before reaching Mexico City," he says.

The caravan has been stopped in a town in Oaxaca, Reuters reports, where participants are "confused and frustrated by paperwork" as officials are registering them and determining their legal status.</s>MATIAS ROMERO, Mexico (AP) — President Donald Trump's angry comments about a caravan of migrants ricochet around like a soccer ball in the dusty athletic complex in southern Mexico where the 1,000 or so Central Americans have camped since the weekend.

Trump's words have confused and befuddled families here, some of whom never intended on going all the way to the United States after the end of the "Stations of the Cross" caravan. It is a symbolic event held around Easter each year to raise awareness about the plight of migrants and has never left southern Mexico, though some participants then continue north on their own.

Even coordinators of the caravan seemed to misunderstand the debate in the U.S. when Trump's endorsed a "nuclear option" for pushing funding for his border wall through Congress. They told worried families Tuesday that the U.S. president had floated the idea of using a nuclear weapon against the caravan of mostly women and children who have fled violence in Central America.

The Mexican government said in a statement late Tuesday that its immigration policy "is not subject to pressure," but noted the caravan "began to disperse by decision of the participants."

It said 465 migrants had asked for transit visas and 230 had gotten them, and another 168 were likely to get some sort of visa to stay in Mexico.

Caravan organizers said the Mexican government had not pressured them, and that they are continuing with plans to hold a migrants' rights symposium this week and wind up with a visit to Mexico City. The caravan was never intended to reach the U.S. border.

Sitting on a thin foam pad and trying to corral her sons, 2-year old Jonathan and 6-year-old Omar, Gabriela Hernandez wondered aloud at what Trump must think of them.

"I see it as something really sad, because I don't understand how a child this age can make things difficult for him," said Hernandez, a 27-year-old who is two months pregnant.

She would like to get into the U.S., where she has a cousin in Houston. Crime in Honduras was so bad that she decided to embark on the difficult a journey across several international borders with two young asthmatic sons, the younger of whom is now sick and on antibiotics.

In the minds of Hernandez and many of her fellow travelers, the risks they have taken should be an indication of how unsustainable their circumstances are back home. Hondurans predominate in this year's caravan, but it includes families from Guatemala and El Salvador as well.

"The big Caravan of People from Honduras, now coming across Mexico and heading to our 'Weak Laws' Border, had better be stopped before it gets there," Trump tweeted.

After hearing that Trump raised the possibility of sending troops to defend the U.S. border, Irineo Mujica, coordinator of the caravan, gathered the camp's women and children around him and asked which of them Trump was afraid of.

"All of the women, children come fleeing violence," Mujica said. "These children are not soldiers."

Late Tuesday, the first migrants began receiving documents from Mexican immigration authorities. Some give them 20 days to transit the country on their way to the U.S. border with the stated goal of applying for asylum. Others got papers in a first step toward a humanitarian Mexican residency visa for especially vulnerable people or a start to the application process for asylum in Mexico.

Mayra Zepeda, 38, of Honduras, said that once she gets documents to cross Mexico, she and her husband will continue their journey toward the border city of Tijuana. She said they hope to find better paying jobs there and aren't planning to try to cross into the U.S.

The couple left Honduras in December after incumbent President Juan Orlando Hernandez was declared the winner of a contested election. The factory where she made T-shirts for export closed due to the weeks of instability that followed the election, she said.

She and her family stopped in the Mexican town of Tapachula at the Guatemala border for three months and she worked in a restaurant. When the caravan came together there they saw it as a good opportunity to make a move with safety in numbers.

On Tuesday afternoon, she cooked a cauldron full of sliced squash and eggs over an open fire for the caravan's security team, volunteers who keep an eye on things.

"Honestly, I want to be Mexican," Zepeda said. "We're not going to cross. We're just going to stay here."

Others were not so fortunate on the first try.

Jose Carlos Lanza, traveling with his pregnant wife from Honduras, rushed forward when his name was called Tuesday only to find that they had got one letter wrong in his name, making his permit to travel across Mexico worthless and potentially delaying him for another day. The problem was that someone was already en route to pick him up and take him to the U.S. border.

"I can't wait any longer," he said.

Earlier Tuesday, Lanza said the U.S. government was ignorant about the migrants' situation.

"They don't see that the majority of the people here are children and women," he said. "I think it's stupid because the only thing we are looking for is safety for our family and it's not fair that they treat us like terrorists."</s>The Mexican government revealed that the caravan of more than 1,500 families from Central America making their way north is part of an annual event occurring over the past seven years without prior interference. Mexico City asserts it is not promoting the irregular migration and is considering how to detain some while granting asylum to others who qualify.

The revelation was made in a recent statement issued by Mexico’s Foreign Relations Ministry where it addressed the issue of jointly dealing with immigration and also discussed the caravan, which has drawn attention from the U.S. government. Mexican officials revealed that the caravan is a public event which tries to bring attention to Central American migrants who are forced to flee their homes to seek refuge at other points north. The caravan has been a yearly event since 2010 and since the migrants entered the country in an irregular fashion, they are subject to Mexican immigration enforcement. The statement makes no mention of any enforcement actions in the previous years and revealed that this year they are offering asylum to those who qualify.

In a recent fact-checking story by the Associated Press, the news organization tried to blast the Trump Administration for the President’s comments regarding Mexico’s lax border security efforts in allowing the caravan to make their way across Mexico. The AP claimed that the migrant caravan was not headed for the U.S.-Mexico Border but to Mexico City for a rally. The AP did acknowledge that many could break from the caravan toward the U.S. The news organization’s claim runs counter to the reporting of every other major outlet including reporting by Spain’s El Diario, Univision, Latin America’s La Prensa Grafica, Telesur TV, Mexico’s El Universal, all reporting that the ultimate goal of the members of the caravan was to reach the U.S. and request asylum or other protected status. The basis for the AP’s fact check appears to come from the news release issued at the start of the caravan by the organization Pueblo Sin Fronteras (People Without Borders) where they claimed to be initially traveling to Mexico City for a series of rallies and workshops from April 5-9, however in their statement, after the rally, they asked for the help from human rights groups and the community in general in providing supplies.

The caravan began on March 25 in southern Mexico where thousands of migrants gathered to begin their march north, Breitbart Texas reported. The advertised goal of the caravan was to bring attention to the lacking security conditions and economic opportunities which uproot Central America families.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and Stephen K. Bannon. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com.

Brandon Darby is managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and Stephen K. Bannon. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.</s>The caravan of Central American migrants whose trek across Mexico infuriated US President Donald Trump began breaking up Thursday, after abandoning its plan to travel en masse to the United States.

Starting in the early morning hours, the migrants began boarding buses or striking out on foot.

Some planned to head to the central Mexican city of Puebla, where the activists who organized the caravan have convened a legal clinic to help the Central Americans seek asylum or visas, whether in Mexico or the United States.

Others were continuing their journey on their own -- not all of them happy about it.

"They told us the caravan's stopping here. I don't have any money for transportation. If I had known, I wouldn't have come in the first place," said Sebastian Alvarez, 34, who left his native Honduras with his wife and three children to join the caravan, and now found himself walking up the road carrying their meager belongings in trash bags.

More than 1,000 migrants had been camped out since Saturday in the town of Matias Romero, in southern Mexico, after setting out on March 25 from Tapachula, on the border with Guatemala.

Their original plan to travel together to the US border triggered a furious backlash from Trump, who ordered the National Guard deployed to the border and threatened to ax what he called Mexico's "cash cow," the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

The greatly reduced caravan is now planning to pause in Puebla, then continue to Mexico City for a rally and end its activities there.

"We expect around 500 or 600 people to come to Mexico City," said Irineo Mujica, head of the activist group People Without Borders (Pueblo sin Fronteras), which organized the caravan.

"Others are traveling to other places in Mexico where they know people, or up to the northern border," he said.

In Matias Romero, residents were donating canned food to migrants to take with them on their journey.

Local authorities were providing free buses to Puebla for the elderly and those traveling with small children.

Other migrants had to make their way however they could -- commercial buses, walking, hitchhiking or hopping the northbound freight train known as "The Beast," long used by migrants crossing Mexico toward the United States.

Mexican immigration authorities have been working with the migrants to regularize their status, while quietly urging the caravan to disperse.

The group is mostly from Honduras, but also includes Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Nicaraguans.

Most of them are fleeing the brutal gang violence that has made Central America home to some of the world's highest murder rates.

Many people in the group were traveling in families of up to 20 people.

The Mexican government is giving the migrants either 30-day temporary visas to allow them to apply for refugee status in Mexico, or 20-day transit visas to give them time to leave the country -- whether bound for home, the United States or elsewhere.

Mexico, which has bristled at Trump's reaction, said Monday it would be up to the United States to decide whether to admit such arrivals or not.

The caravan is an annual event held since 2010. Organizers say its goal is mainly to raise awareness about the plight of the thousands of migrants who cross Mexico each year -- though some participants have traveled all the way to the US border in the past.
The Viacrucis del Migrante caravan of mostly Central American migrants is stopped by Mexican authorities.