On March 27, 40 men were killed in a fire at a migrant detention centre in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, just across the border from El Paso, Texas. The victims hailed from Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Venezuela.
Like so many thousands of refuge seekers from around the world, they had been jailed in Mexico for the crime of aspiring to a better life in the United States – which forces its southern neighbour to act as deputy gatekeeper and migrant antagonist.
I arrived in Ciudad Juárez 10 days after the fire. An altar with candles, flowers, and portraits of the deceased had been erected in front of the detention centre’s charred façade. There I spoke with a young Venezuelan man who had lost a friend in the blaze and who had since been camping out in the cold next to the shrine.
Pulling out his battered phone, he showed me a TikTok tribute to his friend – a man with a big smile and a little son in Venezuela – as well as a series of photos of a pigeon who had recently come to pay respects at the altar. The images of the bird prompted a tender reflection from my interlocutor: “They are such delicate creatures.” READ MORE AT AL JAZEERA ENGLISH.