Border Agents from Beta Group Launch Plan to Save Migrants' Lives Lorena Figueroa - El Paso Times
go to original July 4, 2016

Beta Group agents provide aid to migrants in distress during their journey to the U.S.-Mexico border. (Beta Group)

Mexican immigration agents have activated a plan to make migrants’ lives safer as they journey to the U.S.-Mexico border.

The plan comes as a result of Beta Group, a Mexican federal border unit similar to the U.S. Border Patrol, reporting an increase of over 50 percent in the number of migrants found in distress since the beginning of 2016 compared with the same period last year.

It also comes as a way to protect the lives and belongings of migrants this summer, which has already seen triple-digit heat, said Wilfrido Campbell Saavedra, head of the Mexican Immigration Institute in Chihuahua.

The institute oversees Beta Group and its agents, whose job is to provide aid to migrants in distress during their journey to the U.S.-Mexico border. The group, created in the early 1990s, neither encourages nor prevents undocumented migration.

“The reason behind applying a special work plan during summer is to improve the help given to hundreds of migrants who traveled through Chihuahuense territory in their intent to arrive to the United State, because aside of facing the dangers of heat exposure, the vast majority are vulnerable,” he said.

According to the institute, Beta Group provided assistance to 3,865 migrants, including those who have been rescued from dying in the desert, from the beginning of 2016 to mid-June. During the same period last year, 2,568 migrants were helped.

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