Panama City, Aug 20 (EFE).- Panama on Tuesday began deporting irregular migrants to Colombia on flights financed by the United States.
Officials told EFE that about 30 Colombian citizens, most of whom have criminal records who were detained after crossing the dangerous Darien Gap, departed shortly after 6am local time on the first flight bound for Medellin under an agreement with the US.
Among the Colombian nationals deported on Tuesday was an alleged “hitman” for the Clan del Golfo drug cartel, the head of the National Migration Service (SNM), Roger Mojica, told a press conference.
Mojica said the government of Panamanian president, José Raúl Mulino, was “coordinating and making diplomatic agreements” with countries such as “Ecuador, India and other nations”, to return migrants from those countries who enter Panama illegally through the Darien Gap, the jungle-covered bridge between North and South America.
So far this year, more than 230,000 irregular migrants – the majority Venezuelan nationals – have entered Panama after crossing the jungle, according to data cited by the head of the Migration office.
But there are no plans to repatriate Venezuelans as Panama’s diplomatic relations with the South American country have been frozen since Caracas held disputed elections, Mojica said, explaining that Venezuelans would be allowed “to continue with the controlled migratory flow” to North America.
But the US regional homeland security attaché, Marlen Piñeiro, told the same press conference that “most of the people” who arrive in the US after crossing the Darien “will not qualify to enter” the country.
Panama and the US on July 1 signed an agreement to return migrants who cross the Darien Gap, which last year reached a record 520,000 people.EFE
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