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Migrant group with 81 children stopped at Arizona southern border

The group of mostly Guatemalan nationals included 81 children, and agents say most of them weren’t with a parent or guardian.

SASABE, Ariz. — A large group of undocumented people, including scores of children, were stopped at the US-Mexico border, authorities said on Tuesday.

Border Patrol agents stopped 88 people near Sasabe. That’s a border town in Pima County in the Alter Valley.

The group of mostly Guatemalan nationals included 81 children, and agents say most of them weren’t with a parent or guardian.

Agents say the human trafficking of children has been an ongoing problem along the southern border.

The situation at the US southern border has been called a crisis due to record-breaking numbers of people seeking asylum along with human traffickers and drug smugglers looking to take advantage of those groups.

The Department of Homeland Security said on Monday that it ended a Trump-era policy requiring asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico for hearings in U.S. immigration court, hours after a judge lifted an order in effect since December that it be reinstated.

It’s unclear what will happen to this latest group of migrants who were stopped in Arizona.

    

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