The Beast, or La Bestia, as migrants call it, is a freight train operating between Canada, the US and Mexico. For desperate people travelling with little money, hitching a ride on La Bestia represents the only way to get to the US border, despite this being forbidden by Mexican authorities.
The majority of migrants who undertake this tough and dangerous journey come from countries with some of the highest levels of violence in the world – including Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala – a product of decades of poverty, a lack of fair policies from their governments and a history of US interventions.
