A pregnant Nicaraguan woman died after being abandoned with around 160 other migrants in a truck driven by a people trafficker in northern Mexico, authorities said Monday.
The incident happened on Saturday night in the city of Monclova in the state of Coahuila, which borders the United States, according to officials.
The migrants “were rescued in unbearable conditions,” Deputy Security Minister Ricardo Mejia told reporters, adding that among them was “a pregnant woman who unfortunately lost her life.”
Another 14 migrants of various nationalities were hospitalized, the National Migration Institute (INM) said.
The foreigners had been travelling in a truck container “presumably crowded together, without water or ventilation and with an apparent temperature of 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit),” the INM said.
The authorities picked up 64 of the migrants including Nicaraguans, Hondurans, Guatemalans, and Cubans who will be granted humanitarian visas, it said, adding that around 100 others had fled.
Human traffickers commonly hide undocumented migrants in trucks bringing them from Guatemala into Mexico, from where they head north to the US border.
A horrific road accident in December left 56 undocumented migrants dead after the truck transporting them overturned in the southern state of Chiapas.
