Janaina Tewaney, Panama’s foreign minister, reported this Friday that the Darién jungle, used by thousands of migrants on their way to the United States, will not be a regular transit route; on the contrary, she stated that the measures that are going to be carried out They are to protect the jungle
The dangerous jungle of the Darién, located on the border between Panama and Colombia and used by thousands of migrants on their way to North America, “is not going to be a regular route,” said this Friday, December 23, the Panamanian Foreign Minister, Janaina Tewaney.
“We are not going to ponder any route through the Darién, quite the contrary, the measures that are going to be carried out are to protect the jungle, not to normalize a route,” declared the minister in relation to the unprecedented crisis of migrants from this year, during a meeting with the press.
Also read: More than 220,000 migrants crossed the Darién in 2022: MSF assisted more than 30,000
So far this year, the historic number of 243,681 irregular migrants have crossed the Darién Jungle, mostly Venezuelans, heading towards the US in search of better living conditions, according to official data released this Friday, which show back to the 133,726 passers-by registered in 2021 and the 30,055 in 2016 during the Cuban migration crisis.
“The Darien jungle is not going to be a regular route and Panama decides how to administer it in its territory,” said the official.
“El Darién is a protected jungle and we have kept it that way. It is an ancestral territory of our indigenous people that for millennia has remained that way, it is also our lung. The Darién is for Panama and Central America the same as the Amazon for South America”, the minister clarified.
With information from EFE
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