( Spanish) — At least 10 people, presumably migrants, were found drowned in the Darien jungle in Panama, the director of the country’s National Migration Service, Samira Gozaine, reported on Wednesday.
The official said in statements to the local press that in recent weeks the national Border, Aeronaval and Migration services have rescued several corpses. “We have rescued about 10 corpses (…) in the rivers, unfortunately.”
Gozaine added that some people “continue insisting on crossing despite the mighty rivers.” He reported that as of this Wednesday some 170,000 migrants have entered the Darién jungle on the Panama-Colombia border irregularly.
“20% of that population are children, 50% of that population are under 5 years old, newborn babies. We have seen mothers with newborn babies walking the trail and exposing them to serious dangers”, explained the Director of Migration.
The official explained that they do not receive information on all the migrants who enter the jungle from Colombia, “so we do not know how many people may be staying in the jungle, because we do not know how many to expect.”
Gozaine said that he does not rule out that the migrants are dammed at some point and that the Government of Panama is working on a campaign to offer correct information about what it means to cross that dangerous route.
The official reported that “the number of migrants has been reduced a bit. (This Tuesday) 790 people entered through the trail and we continue to think that it is because of the flooding of the rivers.”
