The start of “deportations and expulsions” on charter and commercial flights of migrants entering Panama through the inhospitable Darién jungle is “imminent,” a U.S. official warned on Tuesday.
This jungle, on the border between Colombia and Panama, has become a corridor for thousands of migrants from South America trying to reach the United States, a country that will hold elections in November with migration as a key issue.
“We have already visited all the airports […], we have visited Darién, we have visited places where we are going to hold the people, we have also talked to the airlines, the contractors, and we are already in the final details,” said Marlen Piñeiro, the U.S. Regional Attaché for Homeland Security.
“We are still negotiating [with Panama] at this moment, but the focus of this program is deportations and expulsions,” explained the official at a press conference in the Panamanian capital. “I don’t want to give a date yet, but I do think it is imminent that we are going to start” with the deportations, she added.
Piñeiro noted that the United States is “working very closely [with Panama] and very aggressively to establish charter flights that will be large numbers, commercial flights that will be large numbers.” She added that the details are still being prepared, “but they will have an impact” on migration flows.
Panama and the United States signed an agreement on July 1 whereby Washington will contribute six million dollars to fund this program. In 2023, more than half a million people, mostly Venezuelans, crossed this jungle filled with dangers such as fast-flowing rivers, wild animals, and criminal groups that rob, rape, and kill.
However, last Thursday, Panama’s President José Raúl Mulino ruled out forcibly repatriating the migrants, clarifying his previous statements. “People do not want to stay in Panama, people want to go to the United States, and if that issue becomes a situation, which can escalate, well, they will go there,” Mulino said.
In recent weeks, Panamanian authorities have closed several trails used by migrants in the jungle, so they use the paths that lead to migration and customs posts. At these posts, there are also officials from international organizations assisting the migrants before they board buses to continue their journey to Costa Rica.
“Obviously, we want the numbers [of migrants] to decrease to the point where the jungle returns to being a jungle, a national park, and not a migratory route,” Piñeiro said.
