By RICARDO CASTILLO    

Migrants Try to Barge into Mexico

Throngs of Central American migrants Sunday, Jan. 19, continued to gather along the Guatemalan border on Sunday, Jan. 19, with the intent of moving through Mexico to the United States.

On Saturday. Jan. 18, approximately 1,500 of the mostly Honduran migrants attempted to stage their first show of force to enter Mexico at the Tecum Uman and Ciudad Hidalgo international bridge. They were repelled by the Mexican National Guard, who used tear gas to disperse the crowd back into Guatemalan territory.

Meanwhile, throngs of people are still arriving at many of the small points of entry into Mexico along border cities such as Tenosique, Ciudad Cuauhtémoc – even Palenque – and smaller points such as El Triunfo, Reforma and Escárcega, according to the Mexican National Migration Institute.

By Sunday, at Tecum Uman at least 3,000 migrants are gathered chanting threats to go hunger strike if Mexico does not let them through.

But Mexican Foreign Relations (SRE) Secretary Marcelo Ebrard has made it clear that the border is not open to undocumented crossers.

In Tegucigalpa, the U.S. Embassy has issued a warning to all members of the “caravan” (many little caravans, in fact) that if they enter the United States illegally, they will be arrested and deported.

William Barr’s Visit

During his visit with Mexican authorities last week, U.S. Attorney General William Barr did not produce much news, either hard or by innuendo.

During two past visits, side events such as the “amiable departure” of exiled former Bolivian President Evo Morales or the arrest of former Mexican top cop Genaro García Luna did occur.

In Morales’ case, it is assumed that Barr requested that he be asked to leave for Cuba.

As for García Luna, his next court appearance in Brooklyn is Monday, Jan. 21.

This time, it was apparently only official business as Barr met with a large group of top security officials headed by Ebrard and Security Secretary Alfonso Durazo.

The Secretaries of Defense, the Interior, Navy, among other top military brass, met with Barr, and – according to a SRE press release — discussed the issue of guns trafficking from the United States to Mexico, as well as the movement of drugs (particularly, the fashionably deadly fentanyl ).

But all the official information that was released came in the form of generalities, nothing specific.

Also attending the gatherings were U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Christopher Landau along with a group of important embassy officials such John Creamer.

Bandits Assault Towns

No sooner was the security summit with Barr over Friday, Jan. 17, than at least 150 men armed with high powered rifles and riding in about 50 pickups stormed the municipality of Madera, in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, invading twin townships, Las Pomas de Arriba and Las Pomas de Abajo (pomas means apples), setting ablaze 22 houses and seven vehicles, according to local Madera Municipality Chihuahua Fiscal General Representative Manuel Carrasco Chacón.

The Mexican Army, the National Guard, the State Security Commission and the State Agency for Investigations immediately “combed the region” by air and land, with no reports of any arrests.

The bandits, according to Carrasco, may be part of a gang known as La Línea – the armed group of the Juárez Cartel, and which operates in the Chihuahua-Sonora Tarahumara Sierra and desert area.

Some inhabitants of the townships that came under attack reported both murders and “pickups,” or kidnappings, but the State Fiscal General’s Office in Chihuahua, though admitting the attacks, denied there had been any killings or kidnappings by the armed men.

Apparently, the attack was on a rival gang and control of the drug trade routes into the United States.

Sports: Ice Hockey

Sixteen-year-old Luisa Wilson became the first Mexican to win a gold medal at the Lausanne Youth World Winter Sports.

She is part of a seven-person Mexican delegation, which would not even have dreamed of a chance at a medal in a winter sport.

But as it turns out, Luisa Wilson lived a long time in Canada – where her father is from – and is a lifelong skating buff, having practiced both figure skating and ice hockey.

Wilson participated in 3×3 hockey matche,s in which players from nations which don’t have much of a winter sport representation form mixed nationality teams.

In any case, Wilson won the first medal for Mexico in the 2020 Lausanne Winter Games.

She flew the Mexican flag.

Sports: Chicharito to Galaxy

World trotter Mexican soccer player Javier “Chicharito” (Little Pea) Hernández has been hired by the Los Angeles Galaxy where he is expected to draw large Mexican soccer crowds with his enormous popularity in Mexico.

He will be one of the best-paid players in Mayor League Soccer, according to Sports Illustrated.

Chicharito was playing in Spain for team Valencia and is slated to show up in Los Angeles anytime this coming week.

According to anonymous sources, Chicharito will be the MLS’s best-paid player, along with Michael Bradley of the Toronto Football Club, who makes $6 million a year.

Chicharito, 31, is the top scorer for Team Mexico and has successfully participated in several World Cup competitions.

At Galaxy, he’s expected to cover for Swedish player Zlatan Ibrahimovic who returned to Italy to play for Milano.