Mexico sees U.S. election behind migrant caravan, seeks to avoid Trump spat

Mexico’s president on Friday said he suspected political interference behind a new migrant caravan in Central America, promising to keep his country out of the U.S. presidential race as the group splintered and some began turning back.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who has taken steps to curb illegal immigration so as to avoid entanglements with his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump, suggested that the caravan’s departure from Honduras had been timed to provoke.

“It is very weird, very strange,” Obrador told a news conference, adding that “it’s a matter that I believe is linked to the U.S. election.”

He said he did not have definitive evidence to support that claim, but his words turned up pressure on the migrants.