To reduce the flow of migrants arriving at the U.S-Mexico border, The United States and El Salvador have mutually agreed to strengthen El Salvador’s capacity to provide for asylum seekers on Friday. However, neither country detailed any concrete actions.

U.S. commits to help build capacity 

Kevin McAleenan, Secretary of the Acting Department of Homeland Security, told US media that the core of this is recognizing El Salvador’s development of their own asylum system and committing to help build that capacity, in Washington. The statement was released soon after he signed documents with El Salvador’s minister of foreign affairs, Alexandra Hill.   

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McAleenan added that migrants crossing through El Salvador should be able to seek protection in the Central American country even if they were intending to apply for asylum in the United States. Although, no one spoke about the necessary arrangements that would take effect or provide details on how it would be carried out. The fact that most migrants from other countries avoid crossing the small, poverty-stricken El Salvador makes it highly unclear how the agreement would work.  

The agreement shows McAleenan’s efforts to seal immigration deals with the Northern Triangle countries of Central America - Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, places from many immigrants arrive at the U.S. southern border set out. President Donald Trump has made immigration enforcement the central focus of his entire administration, welcoming faithfully the flow of migrants, largely including families into the United States.  

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Guatemala signs ‘safe third country’ deal with the United States

Guatemala recently signed the ‘safe third country’ deal with the United States, for asylum-seeking migrants travelling through Guatemala on the way to the U.S.-Mexico border to ask for refuge in Guatemala first, instead of in the United States. However, the deal hasn’t been ratified by the Guatemalan Congress. 

Similarly to Guatemala, The United States has a safe third country agreement with Canada. Honduras’ Foreign Ministry and the U.S. Embassy recently announced that Honduras held talks with the U.S. over migrations this week that is to be continued the next week, in a joint statement on Friday.  

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Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez stated in a local media agency that there was a need for a region-wide agreement with Mexico, Guatemala and the United States due to the increasing numbers of migrants from Cuba and Africa traversing Central America to reach the United States, on Thursday. Hernandez believes that Honduras must become a safe country in order to avoid complicated situations in the future.  

El Salvador, home to 6.6 million people is one of the world’s most violent nations, largely due to criminal gangs involved in drug trafficking and extortion. As the U.S. government has pursued the deals, the Department of Homeland Security in parallel issued a rule that bars most migrants from gaining U.S. asylum if they had not sought safe haven in any country they first transited through.    

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