Trump reports progress, but not enough, in tariff talks with Mexico

President Donald Trump said some progress -- but not enough -- was made Wednesday in talks with Mexico on averting the tariffs he threatens to impose unless the southern neighbour stems the flow of undocumented migrants into the US.

Trump's evening tweet said discussions will resume Thursday, and came as new data showed migrant detentions at the southern US border have hit their highest level since 2006.

Ahead of the high-stakes negotiations Wednesday, the Trump administration laid out tough demands for Mexico City to crack down on hundreds of thousands of Central American migrants traversing the country to the US Mexican border in recent months.

Trump, tweeting from Europe, said "Progress is being made, but not nearly enough!" He said that more talks will be held Thursday "with the understanding" that if no deal is reached, the tariffs he announced last week will go into effect Monday as planned.

That means they will start at five per cent, hit all Mexican imports, and rise incrementally to 25 percent in October.

The tariffs could prove disastrous for Latin America's second-largest economy.

Fitch downgraded Mexico's credit rating Wednesday, saying its economy faced greater risk because of the threatened duties. Another ratings agency, Moody's, changed its outlook for Mexico from stable to negative.

Ahead of Wednesday's meeting, senior White House economic advisor Peter Navarro said Mexico would have to agree to lock down its own southern border and process migrant asylum claims inside Mexico.

Mexico recognises that the situation on the border is untenable, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard told a news conference after Wednesday's negotiating session.

"Why? Because we saw the reports of the numbers and indeed, the flows are growing too much." Ebrard, who leads the Mexican delegation which urgently travelled to Washington, earlier this week drew the line on so-called "safe third-country" asylum, signaling the discussions would be tough.

Speaking from Ireland ahead of the talks, however, Trump said he believed Mexico is ready to "make a deal."
Most were families from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. The total included almost 58,000 children, most hoping to escape chronic poverty and
"That's it. That's what we're looking for."