REUTERS/Jacob GarciaMEXICO CITY, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Mexico's overwhelmed asylum agency is strengthening efforts to weed out high numbers of applicants who "abuse" the system while passing through Mexico to reach the United States, Mexico's top asylum official said on Monday. Mexico has the world's third highest number of asylum applications after the United States and Germany, reflecting growing numbers of refugee seekers that have strained resources at the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR). Once migrants request asylum, they are exempt from deportation and are eligible to seek work, motivating many to file applications even without the intent to stay in Mexico, said Andres Ramirez, COMAR's director. "It's an abuse of the asylum system," he told reporters at COMAR's busy Mexico City office. "In the United States, there's a much bigger Afghan community than what we have here."

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