Central American migrants on “la Bestia” in July, 2008. Every year, thousands of people, 90 percent of them Central American, cross the length of Mexico in hopes of reaching the United States. Many hop trains known as la Bestia (the Beast) facing kidnapping, extortion, rape, robbery, sickness, hunger, and death along the way. And it has only become worse since Mexico ramped up the drug war; in search of easy profits, cartels have started to seize migrants, holding them ransom. Amnesty International has called the migrants’ route “one of the most dangerous in the world.”

First published in the April 26, 2019, 9:13 p.m. edition

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