U.S. continues plan to keep Central American migrants at bay

FILE PHOTO: Hondurans taking part in a new caravan of migrants, set to head to the United States, gather in front of police officers blocking the road in Vado Hondo, Guatemala January 18, 2021. REUTERS/Luis Echeverria/File Photo

CIUDAD HIDALGO, Mexico (Reuters) - ​In the days before U.S. President Joe Biden's inauguration, Mexican soldiers patrolling the banks of the wide Suchiate River found few migrants amid the flow of trade across the water from Guatemala.

The likely explanation lay hundreds of miles to the south, where baton-wielding Guatemalan security forces beat back one the largest U.S.-bound migrant caravans ever assembled, according to a Reuters photographer and other witnesses.