Venezuelan immigrants arrive at Canaan Membrillo, the first border checkpoint of Panama’s Darién province, on October 13, 2022.
Photo: LUIS ACOSTA / AFP / Getty Images
The government of Panama reported on Friday that needs international help to regulate immigration before the new United States immigration policy regarding immigrants Venezuela and called on countries in the region to coordinate measures to alleviate it migration crisis.
Panama’s Secretary of State Janaina Tewaney said in a statement that the Panamanian government is still searching regional initiatives that regulate immigration and that after the US announcement of a “new immigration policy” for Venezuelans, they “immediately coordinated with the Costa Rican Secretary of State and with the head of the US Mission to Panama, Stewart Tuttle.”
This is “for the purpose of coordinating at a technical level how to obtain any form of assistance or to seek technical or logistical cooperation to deal with this crisis,” Tewaney reported.
“On October 10, Panama reached an all-time high of irregular migration by the Darién,” Tawaney said, stressing that it is “urgent that countries in the region, mainly those in the south, understand that they have a responsibility to meet this humanitarian Coordinating the crisis belongs to everyone”.
Panama is the gateway to Central America from the south
Between January and last September, 151,582 undocumented immigrants arrived after crossing the Darién Gap, the dangerous jungle on the border with Colombia, surpassing the historical figure of 133,726 in 2021, and the vast majority (70%) are Venezuelans.
They are whole families with children and even babies in transit across the region towards the United States.
Many of the Venezuelans and Haitians come from second or third countries like Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile or Brazil, where they had already tried to gain a foothold.
Panama receives irregular travelers at Migrant Reception Centers (ERM) on the border with Colombia and Costa Rica, where they register their biometric data and receive food and medical care. in a unique operation on the continent that costs millions of dollars a year.
“At the moment, most migrants have Venezuelan nationality, so coordination with Colombia, Ecuador and other southern countries is important,” said the Panamanian foreign minister.
As Tawaney explained, “a strategy is being developed to propose initiatives coordinated by Costa Rica and the United States at a technical meeting that will be held in Colombia in the next two weeks, allowing joint initiatives to control irregular traffic. “.
The aim is to find a strategy so that this crisis does not directly affect our country.”
Janaina Tewaney, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Panama
He added that the Panamanian government “is interested in improving this situation at the multilateral level because it is the multilateral organizations that will help us in technical matters, in logistics and for any type of fund that is needed for humanitarian and decent purposes are required treatment of these migrants (…) either for their voluntary return or in case they go to Mexico,” he added.
The United States on Wednesday announced an immigration program that gives legal status to Venezuelans who arrive by plane and have a sponsor for two years. Those arriving via the southwest border will be sent back to Mexico.
24,000 Venezuelans will be admitted under this program, from which persons deported from the USA within the last five years are excluded, those who entered Panama or Mexico irregularly, or those who are permanent residents or nationals of countries other than Venezuela.
The first deportation of Venezuelan migrants by the United States government this Thursday surprised hundreds of compatriots and migrants of other nationalities stranded in the Mexican city of Tapachula, in the state of Chiapas on Mexico’s southern border, trying to reach the American Union.