A record number of migrant crossings have been recorded at the border between the United States and Canada in the space of one month.
New statistics reveal that 1,109 people were detained in March 2024.
The number has surged from 756 in March 2023 and just 61 in March 2022, according to to US Customs and Border Protection data.
Figures recorded in March this year are higher than the total amount of crossings in all of 2022 - 1,065.
A group of refugees raises their hands before they illegally cross the border into Canada from Champlain, New York
Getty
Chief Patrol Agent Robert Garcia of the Border Patrol Swanton Sector said the 1,109 apprehensions last month featured people from 40 different countries.
Writing on social media, Garcia said: "The top three nationalities apprehended were 408 Indian, 323 Bangladeshi, and 170 Mexican nationals".
Figures also showed a sharp rise in Indians attempting to illegally enter the US from Canada.
In 2023, 30,010 Indian nationals apprehended at the norther border - compared to just 2,225 two years earlier.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
Indians account for the third-largest group of undocumented migrants in the US.
Devesh Kapur, a South Asian studies professor at Johns Hopkins University said that a shortage of jobs in India has contributed to a "culture of migration".
Shinder Purewal, from Kwantlen Polytechnic University in British Columbia, added: "It's easier to get a visa to Canada than to Pakistan."
"More and more people are entering Canada, so they can just go straight to the US", he told Voice of America.
Chief Patrol Agent Robert Garcia of the Border Patrol Swanton Sector said the 1,109 apprehensions last month featured people from 40 different countries
Getty
There has also been a surge from other countries in Asia, including Chinese nationals.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has arrested almost 25,000 nationals from the People's Republic of China (PRC) since October.
The number of illegal migrants moving in from China jumped in 2023 with 24,125 crossing that year.