GUATEMALA CITY, GUATEMALA, DECEMBER 26, 2001: Forty-two migrants from India have been held in Guatemala for four months, after four months of detention in Mexico. The undocumented immigrants have been held in a dark two-bedroom shelter equipped with bunk beds, locks, metal bars and armed guards. Acknowledging that the Indians were heading north, the U.S. pays the Guatemalan government about $8.50 per migrant per day as long as they remain behind bars. Since October, the embassy has spent $30,000 on what even Guatemala’s director of immigration says may be the illegal detention of migrants. A brewing controversy surrounding Indian migrants in Guatemala city is the latest outcome of recent cooperation between Central American governments and Mexico, designed to stem illegal migration to the United States. Officials say deportations of Indians are often delayed because the home countries don’t provide the paperwork necessary for repatriation. The recent suicide of one of the Indian migrants has drawn the attention of human rights activists. Activists say the migrant who killed himself this month faced a staggering debt to smugglers. People from India pay about $30,000 for voyage through Central America to the United States.
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