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The Guardian

Ledy Perez grasped her six-year-old son and sobbed as she begged a Mexican guard to let her bring him across the US-Mexico border and to, hopefully, a better future than the one she faced at home in Guatemala.
The image of Perez embracing her son, Anthony Diaz, as he stares at guards clad in desert fatigues and armed with assault rifles has made headlines in Mexico and gone viral in the US.
Through sobs, Perez repeatedly asks the officers let her pass in a video posted by Mexico’s El Universal newspaper.
“Don’t let them send me back,” she says. “I just want to give my son a better life.”


Families arrived at the US border from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador at record rates in the spring, fleeing a toxic mix of violence, poverty, food insecurity, climate change and corruption.
Under pressure from the US to stem the flow, Mexico’s president, Andres Manuel López Obrador, directed nearly a third of the country’s militarised national guard police force to patrol the border. He insists the rights of migrants must be upheld, but the image of Perez’s plight garnered criticism in Mexico.
On Tuesday, former Mexican president Felipe Calderon retweeted the photo and wrote: “What a pity! The Mexico government should not have accepted this.”
The national guard deployment, along with the hot summer weather, saw the number of people apprehended at the border fall in June though the factors driving people out of the region, known as the Northern Triangle, have not been resolved.
The Reuters photographer Jose Luis Gonzalez captured the powerful images and said the soldier centred in the photo did not provide his name, but said he was only following orders.

There was no overt aggression in the nine-minute encounter in Ciudad Juarez, Gonzalez told Reuters.
Perez was undaunted by the soldiers’ steely response and lunged for the border with her son when the soldier looked away, Gonzalez said.
Listen to heartbreaking cries of children begging for parents, as ‘US border agent’ likens them to an ‘orchestra’
Sprinting across the riverbank, the pair made it out of the national guard’s jurisdiction into US territory, where they were taken into custody by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
From there, they could be brought to a US detention facility, freed until their immigration case is heard by a judge or returned to Mexico while their asylum claim is processed.

The crossing Perez and Anthony eventually made is often characterised as an “illegal” entry, despite the Trump administration making legal crossings for asylum seekers nearly impossible.
The difficulty of requesting asylum has driven people to attempt entry at other parts of the border, often with the intent of being apprehended by US border patrol.
Image of sobbing migrant child at US border breaks hearts around the world
Under an informal policy known as “metering”, asylum seekers must wait months before they are allowed to approach US officials and request asylum.
Nearly 20,000 people who have managed to request asylum from a US official have since been returned to Mexico to wait for their case to be processed as part of the Trump administration’s opaque Remain in Mexico policy.
The returned migrants have told journalists, advocates and courts that they were extorted, assaulted and raped in Mexico.
Is the migrant ‘caravan’ a security threat? Tracing the word’s humble origins
It is unclear what comes next for Perez and her son, but the photographer said her face in the photos was “a small reflection of all migrants’ suffering”.
Gonzalez said: “A lot of people judge migrants, ask why don’t they stay in their country, why do they come here or why are they crossing into the United States … Every migrant has a story.”


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US immigration

Heartbreaking photo of mother begging Mexican soldier becomes symbol of migrant struggle

Guatemalan migrant Ledy Perez embraces her son, Anthony, while praying to ask a member of the Mexican national guard to let them cross into the US, as seen from Ciudad Juarez. Photo: Reuters

A Central American migrant looks on from a fence at Madre Assunta Institute, a shelter for migrant women and children in Tijuana, Baja California state, Mexico on July 13, 2019. - Asylum seekers in the US are overflowing shelters in Mexico waiting for their claims to be processed. (Photo by Eduardo Jaramillo Castro / AFP)

REFILE - CORRECTING TYPO IN PEREZ'S FIRST NAME Guatemalan migrant Ledy Perez embraces her son Anthony while asking a member of the Mexican National Guard to let them cross into the United States, as seen from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico July 22, 2019. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez

Listen to heartbreaking cries of children begging for parents, as ‘US border agent’ likens them to an ‘orchestra’

Central American asylum seekers, including a Honduran girl and her mother, are taken into custody near the US-Mexico border in McAllen, Texas. Photo: AFP

LOS ANGELES, CA - JUNE 18: Protestors demonstrate against the separation of migrant children from their families in front of the Federal Building on June 18, 2018 in Los Angeles, California. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 162 undocumented immigrants last week during a three-day operation in Los Angeles and surrounding areas. Mario Tama/Getty Images/AFP == FOR NEWSPAPERS, INTERNET, TELCOS & TELEVISION USE ONLY ==

MCALLEN, TX - JUNE 12: A Honduran mother holds her two-year-old daughter while being detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents near the U.S.-Mexico border on June 12, 2018 in McAllen, Texas. The asylum seekers had rafted across the Rio Grande from Mexico and were detained before being sent to a processing center for possible separation. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is executing the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy towards undocumented immigrants. U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions also said that domestic and gang violence in immigrants' country of origin would no longer qualify them for political asylum status. John Moore/Getty Images/AFP == FOR NEWSPAPERS, INTERNET, TELCOS & TELEVISION USE ONLY ==

Image of sobbing migrant child at US border breaks hearts around the world

A two-year-old Honduran asylum seeker cries as her mother is searched and detained near the US-Mexico border, in McAllen, Texas. Photo: AFP

MCALLEN, TX - JUNE 12: Central American asylum seekers, including a Honduran girl, 2, and her mother are taken into custody near the U.S.-Mexico border on June 12, 2018 in McAllen, Texas. The group of women and children had rafted across the Rio Grande from Mexico and were detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents before being sent to a processing center for possible separation. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is executing the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy towards undocumented immigrants. U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions also said that domestic and gang violence in immigrants' country of origin would no longer qualify them for political asylum status. John Moore/Getty Images/AFP == FOR NEWSPAPERS, INTERNET, TELCOS & TELEVISION USE ONLY ==

MCALLEN, TX - JUNE 12: A two-year-old Honduran asylum seeker cries as her mother is searched and detained near the U.S.-Mexico border on June 12, 2018 in McAllen, Texas. The asylum seekers had rafted across the Rio Grande from Mexico and were detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents before being sent to a processing center for possible separation. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is executing the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy towards undocumented immigrants. U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions also said that domestic and gang violence in immigrants' country of origin would no longer qualify them for political asylum status. John Moore/Getty Images/AFP == FOR NEWSPAPERS, INTERNET, TELCOS & TELEVISION USE ONLY ==

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Viral images show Ledy Perez sobbing as she pleads with an armed guard to let her and her son, 6, cross the US-Mexico border


Images show Ledy Perez sobbing as she pleads with an armed guard to let her and her son, 6, cross the US-Mexico border.


United States

Mexico

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US Politics