Mexicans form ‘human wall’ to protest US President Donald Trump’s border plan

Hundreds of people in Mexico have gathered on the country’s border with the United States to form a “human wall” to protest US President Donald Trump’s controversial plan to build a wall between the two countries.

On Friday, the demonstrators gathered in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, the largest city in the northwestern state of Chihuahua, and formed a human chain along the banks of the Rio Grande River, which forms part of the Mexico-US border.

The protesters also held aloft colorful stripes of cloth and waved to the residents of the US city of El Paso, in Texas, which lies across from Ciudad Juarez on the other side of the river.

“We have, as it is being demonstrated here, many friends on the other side of the river, on the other side where they intend to build this wall that will never separate two friendly peoples,” said former Mexican presidential candidate Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, one of the organizers of the protest.

On January 25, the US president signed executive actions to begin the construction of the Mexico border wall to deter illegal immigrants from entering the US, and increase the number of immigration enforcement officers who carry out deportations. 

Trump had earlier called on Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to pay for the border wall, a controversial move that sparked a rift between the two countries.

Pena Nieto, however, made it clear, on a number of occasions, that his country would not pay for the project.