Migrants pass quickly through once impenetrable Darien jungle as governments scramble for answers
Source: Associated Press
Migrants pass quickly through once impenetrable Darien jungle as governments scramble for answers
BY JUAN ZAMORANO
Updated 7:16 PM EDT, October 6, 2023
BAJO CHIQUITO, Panama (AP) — Rain-swollen rivers only briefly slowed the otherwise uninterrupted flow of migrants through this jungle-covered border area separating Colombia and Panama and by midweek another 2,000 bedraggled migrants stumbled out of the Darien jungle.
Pregnant women and men carrying children atop their shoulders waded across the waist-deep Tuquesa river and into the Indigenous outpost of Bajo Chiquito where some fell to the ground in exhaustion and relief as Panamanian officials waited to register their arrival.
Crossing through the dense, lawless jungle not long ago was unthinkable to most people. In recent years, it became a brutal slog of a week or more. But some migrants arriving this week described an organized trek completed in as little as 2 ½ days on trails marked by colored ribbons and assisted by guides and porters, part of what officials say has become a business generating millions of dollars.
That efficiency combined with the unrelenting economic factors pushing migrants to leave countries like Venezuela, whose citizens account for the majority of them, have resulted in more than 400,000 migrants crossing the Darien this year. The dizzying number of 500,000 – double last year’s record total – is now on the horizon.
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Read more: https://apnews.com/article/panama-darien-colombia-migrants-da582a3f695206f68952dddccaa93f6d
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