Mexico intends to deport the approximately 500 migrants involved in illegally trying to cross the border between Mexico and the United States, the country’s Interior Ministry said in a statement.
Though the country’s authorities reportedly contained the protests on their side of the San Ysidro port of entry between Tijuana and the San Diego area, Mexico still does not intend to send its military to help control the over 7,000 migrants already gathered at the border, the statement added, according to Reuters.
Central American migrants -mostly from Honduras- struggle with Mexican Police officers near the El Chaparral border crossing close to the Mexico-US border, in Tijuana, Baja California State, Mexico, on November 25, 2018. – US officials closed the San Ysidro crossing point in southern California on Sunday after hundreds of migrants, part of the “caravan” condemned by President Donald Trump, tried to breach a fence from Tijuana, authorities announced. (GUILLERMO ARIAS/AFP/Getty Images)
The group has already been “rounded up,” BBC reported. (RELATED: Tucker Exposes ‘Ruling Class’ Behind Border Policy Uproar: ‘Their Goal Is To Change Your Country Forever’)
“Far from helping their objectives,” the statement read, the actions of the migrants were illegal and could have caused a “serious incident.”
Video and pictures showed hundreds of mostly male migrants rushing towards the border. Several threw projectiles at border patrol agents.
A group of Central American migrants -mostly from Honduras- get over a fence as they try to reach the US-Mexico border near the El Chaparral border crossing in Tijuana, Baja California State, Mexico, on November 25, 2018. – US officials closed the San Ysidro crossing point in southern California on Sunday after hundreds of migrants, part of the “caravan” condemned by President Donald Trump, tried to breach a fence from Tijuana, authorities announced. (PEDRO PARDO/AFP/Getty Images)
Some climbed the first fence and were about to climb the second when they were reportedly repelled by tear gas from the U.S. side, AFP reported.
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen issued a statement Sunday afternoon condemning the “lawlessness” displayed and promising to prosecute “to the fullest extent of the law anyone who destroys federal property, endangers our frontline operators, or violates our nation’s sovereignty.”