Two Ecuadorean girls who were abruptly dumped over a steel barrier at the Mexico-United States border could soon be reunited with their pa...
Two Ecuadorean girls who were abruptly dumped over a steel barrier at the Mexico-United States border could soon be reunited with their parents in New York City, an official with Consulate of Ecuador in Houston told DailyMail.com on Wednesday.
Surveillance video footage released by Border Patrol showed the moment on March 30 when a human smuggler dropped Yareli, three, and her five-year-old sister Yasmina over the 14-foot high border wall in New Mexico last Tuesday.
Another smuggler was waiting on the American side to catch the girls, who were then tossed to the ground. Both smugglers then fled, abandoning the children.
The surveillance camera operator immediately alerted Santa Teresa Border Patrol Station agents and directed them to the remote location.
The girls' mother, Yolanda Macas Tene, and father, Diego Vacacela Aguilar, had left their Ecuadorean home not long before, relatives said, and were awaiting their daughters in New York City.
El Paso Sector Chief Patrol Agent Gloria Chavez provides snacks to the two girls from Ecuador who were abandoned by human smugglers and dropped over a 14-foot high border wall in New Mexico last Tuesday. An official with the Consulate of Ecuador in Houston told DailyMail.com on Wednesday that the children will be reunited with their parents, who reside in New York
Footage release by U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows a human smuggler (top) climbing over the Mexico-United States border wall in New Mexico after dropping two sisters from Ecuador, aged 3 and 5, over the steel barrier last Tuesday
Their paternal grandfather, Lauro Vacacela, told Telemundo from the family's hometown of Jaboncillo that the couple were desperate to be reunited with their children.
'Their parents really wanted to be with them, and the mother was suffering immensely, so they sent for them,' he said.
The girls had lived with Vacacela, and their brightly-painted pink bedroom still had all their toys and clothes.
Vacacela did not know how the girls arrived at the border, or how much was paid to the people traffickers, known as 'coyotes'.
Asked if he was concerned, he replied: 'Yes, it can be rather risky, you could say.'
Lauro Vacacela, grandfather of the girls, spoke from the family home in Jaboncillo, Ecuador
Vacacela showed Telemundo the bright pink bedroom where the young girls lived
Baskets of clothes and toys which belonged to the girls are seen in their Ecuadorean home
Parents Yolanda and Diego, with daughters Yareli and Yasmina, lived in this wooden home
Rosa Macas, the girls' maternal aunt, was horrified on seeing them dumped in the desert
Maternal grandfather Manuel Macas begged Joe Biden to have pity on the two young girls
The girls' maternal aunt, Rosa Macas, said she was horrified when she saw what happened to the two.
'Maybe if they had been with me, they would never have left,' she said.
Manuel Macas, their maternal grandfather, begged Joe Biden to allow the family to be reunited in New York.
'Help us - let these two innocent girls be with their parents in New York, so they can be loved' he said.
Magdalena Núñez told DailyMail.com that Consulate of Ecuador officials had a chance to speak with the girls via a videoconference call on Monday.
'The girls are in excellent health,' she said in phone interview.
The number of migrants crossing into the United States has skyrocketed to the highest levels in at least 15 years, it emerged this week, and record numbers of teenagers and children arriving without parents have overwhelmed the government’s ability to care for them.
U.S. agents took more than 171,000 migrants into custody last month, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection figures.
Last month, CBP took in more than 18,800 unaccompanied minors - a 99 per cent increase from February and a figure far above the previous one-month high of 11,861 in May 2019.
On Wednesday it emerged that, two days after the Ecuadorean girls were abandoned, a 10-year-old Nicaraguan boy had been found alone.
The child was found sobbing uncontrollably, stumbling along a desert road in Texas.
The 10-year-old boy from Nicaragua was found sobbing uncontrollably in the desert on April 1
The Border Patrol came across the lost child, abandoned by other migrants, in Texas
He asked the border agent: 'Can you help me?'
He explained that the group of migrants he had been traveling with had abandoned him while he slept.
Attempting to prevent future incidents similar the one involving the two Ecuadorean girls and the Nicaraguan boy will certainly be at the top of the to do list for Vice President Kamala Harris, who on March 24 was picked by Biden to lead the efforts in crafting a solution for its immigration crisis.
Harris has, however, still to visit the United States-Mexico border or even hold a press conference about her new duties in the two weeks since being tasked with addressing the migrant crisis.
The Vice President spent Easter weekend at her Brentwood home in Southern California, but did not find time in her schedule to visit the nearby border.
In the past two weeks she has also visited Connecticut for a talk with the Boys and Girls Club of New Haven and flew out Oakland to meet with California governor Gavin Newsom to show support amid his potential recall election.
Núñez added that the consulate is pleased with the treatment that U.S. Customs and Border Protection has provided for the sisters, who are currently being held at the El Paso Processing Center.
U.S. federal guidelines stipulate that children can't be held at the detention centers past 72 hours after they have been apprehended by the Border Patrol.
The law requires the children to be transferred to the care of the Department of Health and Human Services [HHS]. The Office of Refugee Resettlement is in charge of providing longer-term shelters for the minors.
Núñez could not provide a specific timeline for the girl to be reunited with their parents, who live in New York.
'They will do it as agile as possible. The consulate has been looking to make sure that they are placed at a safe place,' she said.
It's unknown if the parents are legally residing in the United States.
Immediately after the girls landed on the ground, two smugglers could be seen fleeing on the Mexican side of the border
CBP stats show that more than 4,000 people who were abandoned by human smugglers, or 'coyotes' as they are referred to in Spanish, have been rescued by Border Patrol agents in the southwest border region since October 1, 2020.
'The inhumane way smugglers abuse children while profiting off parents' desperation is criminal and morally reprehensible. Just this month, a young girl died by drowning, a six-month-old was thrown into the river, and two young children were dropped from a wall and left in the desert alone,' Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement.
'There can be no doubt that children are exceptionally vulnerable when placed in the hands of smugglers. There is grave risk they will be exploited and harmed. I applaud our heroic Border Patrol agents who have saved lives this week and every week, while putting their own lives at risk for the greater good of the country.'
U.S. Border Patrol EL Paso Sector Chief Gloria Chavez previously had mentioned that the agency's goal was to reunite the girls with the parents.
'I'm appalled by the way these smugglers viciously dropped innocent children from a 14-foot border barrier at night. If they had not been seen, the girls could have been left in the desert for hours,' Chavez said.
'We are currently working with our law enforcement partners in Mexico and attempting to identify these ruthless human smugglers so as to hold them accountable to the fullest extent of the law.'
New government statistics released last week revealed that 171,000 migrants were caught by US authorities at the border in March - the highest monthly total in two decades and the latest sign of the mounting humanitarian challenge confronting President Joe Biden.
The total includes about 19,000 unaccompanied migrant children and 53,000 family members traveling together, the preliminary figures showed.
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