(UTV|COLOMBO) – Mexico admits it has 45 days to reduce the number of US-bound migrants, in a deal agreed with the US that staved off the imposition of tariffs.
Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said if troop reinforcements on its southern borders did not work, “additional measures” would need to be discussed.
He said this might mean a “regional solution” involving other nations.
But the US is also likely to require Mexico to process the asylum claims of migrants on its own soil.
He held a press conference which seemed to suggest a difference of opinion about what was actually in the deal announced between the US and Mexico last Friday.
In a tweet, US President Donald Trump said there was a “very important part” of the deal that had been “fully signed and documented” but not yet announced that would give the US what it had been asking for “for many years”.
“It will be revealed in the not too distant future and will need a vote by Mexico’s legislative body”, the president tweeted, adding that if the vote failed “tariffs will be reinstated”.
Commentators suggest this is the “safe third country” arrangement, under which migrants would have to apply first for asylum in Mexico, rather than the US, and be turned away if they do not.
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