Panama deports 29 Colombian migrants from Darien Gap under US deal | Migration News

The first group of migrants has been deported under the migrant repatriation agreement signed with the US in July.

Panama has deported 29 Colombians with suspected criminal pasts who entered the country through the inhospitable Darien Gap. This is the first time that Panama has entered into an agreement on the repatriation of migrants, which was signed with the United States in July.

“We have the first flight of the agreement financed by the United States,” Panamanian Deputy Security Minister Luis Felipe Icaza, accompanied by U.S. officials, told reporters on Tuesday after the charter flight took off at dawn en route to Bogota.

Before the group boarded the Fokker 50 aircraft, they were lined up along the runway and checked with metal detectors.

The 29 deportees, who had no luggage, were handcuffed and slowly climbed the steps of the plane.

Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino, who took office on July 1, had originally said the flights would be “voluntary” repatriations, but those deported on Tuesday had criminal records, officials said.

Icaza said the next flight under the deal could depart on Friday or Saturday.

Transit countries like Panama and Mexico are under increasing pressure from Washington to tackle the highly contentious migration issue in a US election year.

Washington has pledged $6 million to repatriate migrants from the Central American country, hoping to reduce the number of illegal crossings at its own southern border.

In the first phase, migrants with criminal records will be deported, but the agreement could also include deporting anyone who enters Panama through the notoriously dangerous and rugged Darien Gap region on their way to the US.

This was the first group to be deported under the agreement, although Panama earlier this year sent several charter flights to Colombia carrying Colombian nationals with criminal records.

The Darien Gap between Colombia and Panama has become a major corridor for migrants traveling overland from South America through Central America and Mexico to the US.

Despite the dangers, including attacks by criminal gangs, more than half a million undocumented migrants – mostly Venezuelans – crossed the Darién last year.

But Panama cannot deport Venezuelans for the time being, as relations between the two countries have become tense since Panama refused to recognize the results of Venezuela’s elections and grant President Nicolas Maduro a new term.

The two countries have suspended their diplomatic relations.

Roger Mojico, director of Panama’s National Immigration Service, told reporters Tuesday that Panama is talking to other countries, such as Ecuador and India, about coordinating repatriation flights.