Migrants set fire in midnight camp raid in northern Mexico

By Jose Luis Gonzalez

CHIHUAHUA, Mexico (Reuters) - Migrants trying to avoid arrest set fire to blankets and mattresses at a camp in the northern Mexican city of Chihuahua during a raid by government forces to clear the site in the early hours of Saturday.

The enforcement action near the U.S. border come just ahead of the inauguration on Monday of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has accused Mexico's government of not doing enough to curb migration to the U.S. and threatened sweeping tariffs.

About 250 Mexican officials, including National Guard military police in anti-riot gear, surrounded the encampment at around midnight, according to a Reuters witness.

Migrants began setting fire to mattresses and blankets in protest, the witness said, and tried to slip out of the site carrying babies and belongings.

No deaths or injuries were reported in the blaze, which was extinguished in under an hour.

Mexico's migration agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A migration official, who was not authorized to speak to reporters, told Reuters that the goal of the operation was to bring the migrants to Mexico's southern border, where they would be told to return to their home countries.

It was not clear how many people were detained.

Many among the 150 migrants were Venezuelan families who had stopped at the camp in Chihuahua city, about 220 miles (360 km) from the border city of Ciudad Juarez across from El Paso, Texas, as they headed north to the U.S.

Venezuelan migrant Daniel Barrios, traveling with a woman carrying a baby on her back and a child with a sparkly blue backpack, said they were taken aback by the sudden police presence.

"They surrounded the camp ... they asked just to talk, that they were going to do an inspection and all that," he said.

"Tell me, is it logical to come with this whole police and military force, supposedly to do an inspection at a camp, when they could do it during the day?"

Barrios cut off his comments as he saw officials in the distance, saying, "We have to move."

Another family that also fled the camp said they were confused and frightened. A woman sobbed as she clutched two children close to her, and two men held toddlers in their arms, as red smoke rose high into the air behind them.

"The police came, and migration officials. We got to this shelter today, and we don't know what's happening," said one of the men. "We're disoriented. We're scared."

(Reporting by Jose Luis Gonzalez, Writing by Daina Beth Solomon, editing by Deepa Babington)