Vice Minister of the Interior Carmen Muñoz told The Tico Times that the cease-fire announcement between Colombia and the FARC could result in a drop in the number of asylum-seekers from Colombia.
One U.S. official expelled was reportedly on assignment to research a transoceanic canal that a Chinese company plans to build to rival the one in Panama.
The Tico Times sat down with Communications Minister Mauricio Herrera to talk about how the government is approaching the latest wave of unauthorized immigration, which included more than 1,400 people in May.
As news came over the weekend that Panama would carry out another airlift to Mexico for 3,800 unauthorized Cuban migrants there, hundreds of migrants from across Africa remain in Costa Rica with no way forward.
Panama reached a deal to transfer nearly 4,000 U.S.-bound Cubans stranded on its territory to Mexico and announced Monday that the country would close its southern border with Colombia to Cubans without visas.
Finding a country willing to accept these migrants is going to be a herculean task, if not "impossible," says the Migration Policy Institute's Demetrios Papademetriou.
Arguments are scheduled to start Monday in the U.S. Supreme Court battle over President Barack Obama's plan to shield millions of undocumented immigrants from deportation.
