Migrants depart southern Mexico in caravan to protest slow asylum process

FILE PHOTO: Migrants from Central America, Haiti and Cuba queue outside the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR) to apply for asylum and refugee status in Mexico, in Tapachula, Mexico May 6, 2021. REUTERS/Jose Torres

TAPACHULA, Mexico (Reuters) -Mexico has deployed hundreds of security forces to head off a caravan of migrants and asylum seekers who departed the southern Mexican city of Tapachula en masse on Saturday in efforts to reach the Mexican capital, where they hoped to seek expedited asylum proceedings.

Videos posted to social media showed confrontations between members of Mexico's heavily militarized National Guard and the migrants, many of whom were accompanied by young children or carrying babies in their arms.