Washington Post bureau chief for Mexico and Central America. Former bureau chief in Africa and Afghanistan. Ashamed Floridian. SieffK@washpost.com
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Dec 9, 2022 • 8 tweets • 4 min read
México está construyendo un tren turístico de 1.500 Kms a través de una de las mayores concentraciones de antigüedades del mundo: el epicentro de la civilización Maya. Hemos documentando lo que pronto se perderá. 1/x
A pocos metros de la ruta del tren, los arqueólogos se toparon con un cenote inexplorado. Enviaron buzos a explorar y encontraron una canoa maya de 1.000 años de antigüedad. Desde entonces, los descubrimientos, bajo el agua y en la superficie, han sido continuos. 2/x
Dec 9, 2022 • 9 tweets • 6 min read
Mexico is building a 950-mile tourist train through one of the greatest concentrations of antiquities in the world -- the epicenter of Maya civilization. We've been documenting what is soon to be lost. 1/x
A few yards from the path of the train, archeologists stumbled upon an unexplored cenote. They sent divers to explore its caverns, and found a 1,000-year-old Maya canoe. Since then, the discoveries – underwater and above ground -- have been nonstop. 2/x
Jun 3, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Every year, hundreds of American fugitives flee to Mexico. What they don't know: An undercover Mexican police unit now hunts exclusively for gringo criminals. I followed the team as they chased a murderer from California. It didn't end the way I expected. washingtonpost.com/world/interact…
An incomplete list of where Mexican officers have found American fugitives:
In beach resorts. Dangling from parasails. In remote mountain cabins. At a nightclub called Papas & Beer. In trailer parks. In cars with prostitutes. In Carl’s Jr. parking lots.
Feb 18, 2022 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
Germán Silva, one of the best athletes in Mexico's history, is running the entire length of his country, from Tijuana to Tulum. More than a marathon a day over 3,100 miles. I joined him for a while, and it ended up becoming one of my favorite stories ever.
Aside from the physical challenge of running through some of the most difficult terrain in North America, there were other obstacles. Among them: cartel checkpoints. washingtonpost.com/world/interact…
Nov 22, 2019 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Children are freezing in the biggest refugee camp on the US-Mexico border, while they await their asylum hearings. Dozens of parents are making an impossible choice — sending their kids across the Rio Grande alone to save them. washingtonpost.com/world/the_amer…
I’ve spent much of my career covering refugee camps in Africa and Asia. This was one of the grimmest camps I’ve ever seen, 20 yards from American soil.
Mar 2, 2019 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
BREAKING: 29 migrant parents who were separated from their children and deported last year have returned to the border, demanding asylum hearings: washingtonpost.com/world/the_amer…
I’m with the parents now in Mexicali. For now, @CBP won’t let them across the border. Their children are in shelters, foster homes and with relatives across the US. They haven’t seen them since last summer.
Oct 21, 2018 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
“These are some bad people coming through, these aren’t babies, these aren’t little angels coming into our country.”
"You have some very, very bad people in the caravan. You have some very tough criminal elements within the caravan.”
Jun 22, 2018 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
It is shockingly difficult for immigration attorneys to locate children separated from their parents at the border. Today I spoke to lawyers who represent more than 400 parents. They've located two children.
Some of the bureaucratic failures are remarkable: Border Patrol agents who forgot to note that a child crossed the border with a parent. Mothers who were never given the toll-free phone number where they can ask about their kids.
Jan 17, 2018 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Some thoughts on our post-shithole era, after a week traveling through West Africa with an American passport.
Before he was elected, Trump called South Africa a "crime ridden mess" and said the US had "suffered enough" from Somali refugees. That was pretty much the extent of his Africa policy.