In a bizarre display of self-mutilation, a dozen migrants from Central and South America sewed shut their mouths Tuesday to persuade Mexican authorities to permit their journey north to the U.S. border.
The migrants, among thousands hemmed in in the southern Mexico city of Tapachula for the past several months, helped one another sew shut their mouths with needles and plastic threads, leaving a small space to consume liquids. They reportedly committed the acts to protest northward travel restrictions set by the Mexican government. Virtually all migrants entering Mexico from the south, it should be noted, have only one objective: the United States.
Irineo Mujica, self-described leader of the migrants (whom we’ve heard from before) said, “The migrants are sewing their lips together as a sign of protest. We hope that the National Migration Institute can see that they are bleeding, that they are human beings.”
The United States has had a long-standing policy of declaring inadmissible foreign nationals with a “mental or physical disorder posing a threat to self or others.” To most rational persons, that would seem to exclude these people. Waivers of the rule are of course possible, and in our opinion they’re probably no crazier than the Big Guy in the White House.
For more, see Reuters.