MEXICO CITY — Mexican migration authorities said they have deported 2,300 Hondurans who illegally crossed over from Guatemala with a caravan heading to the United States.

The "assisted return" of the Central Americans took place between Jan. 18 and on Monday, according to the interior ministry and the National Migration Institute.

A total of 1,064 Honduran migrants were deported on National Guard planes and charter aircraft, they said in a statement.

Another 1,239 were repatriated by land from the southern states of Chiapas and Tabasco, the institute said.

The Central Americans entered Mexico last week from Guatemala with the so-called "2020 Caravan" with the intention of heading to the United States.

Mexican authorities said the deportations were carried out "in compliance with the migration law and with full respect for human rights."

Members of the National Guard last Thursday used tear gas as they arrested some 800 members of the caravan along the southern border with Guatemala, causing panic among the migrants who included women and children.

Thousands of Central Americans have crossed Mexico toward the United States in caravans in recent years, fleeing chronic poverty and brutal gang violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

Mexico faces pressure to keep the migrants from crossing its northern border from US President Donald Trump, who last year threatened to impose steep tariffs if the country did not do more to stop a surge of undocumented Central Americans.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador deployed some 26,000 troops to the country's borders in response. — AFP