Truck carrying migrants from India, Pak, other countries shot by Mexican soldiers, six killed
Chiapas: Mexico’s Defence Department reported on Wednesday that a truck carrying migrants from India, Pakistan, Nepal, and other countries was fired upon by Mexican soldiers near the Guatemala border which resulted in the death of six migrants.
The soldiers claimed that they heard gunfire as the truck and two other vehicles approached their position on Tuesday in the southern state of Chiapas. Two soldiers opened fire on the truck and four migrants were found dead on the spot while 12 were wounded.
The Defence Department announced in a press release that “military personnel identified identified 33 migrants of Egyptian, Nepalese, Cuban, Indian, Pakistani, and Arab nationality, of whom 4 had died, 12 injured, and 17 unharmed.” It added that two more people died after being transported to a local hospital.
Additionally, the two soldiers who fired their weapons have been relieved of duty while investigations are currently underway.
The area is reportedly a common route for smuggling migrants, who are often crammed into overcrowded freight trucks.
Irineo Mujica, a migrant rights activist who has frequently accompanied caravans in the Chiapas region, expressed skepticism that the migrants or their smugglers would have opened fire. “It is really impossible that these people would have been shooting at the army,” Mujica was quoted as saying by The Associated Press He added that most of the time they get through by paying bribes.
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Pakistan reports two more polio cases; Total tally now 52
ISLAMABAD: At least two more cases of poliovirus were reported in Pakistan, taking the number of infections to 52 so far this year, a report said on Friday.
“The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health has confirmed the detection of two more wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) cases in Pakistan," an official statement said.
The fresh infections — a boy and a girl — were reported from the Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.
“Genetic sequencing of the samples collected from the children is underway," the statement read. Dera Ismail Khan, one of the seven polio-endemic districts of southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, has reported five polio cases so far this year.
Of the 52 cases in the country this year, 24 are from Balochistan, 13 from Sindh, 13 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.
There is no cure for polio. Only multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five can keep them protected.
