Colombian official: Migrant influx in Darién jungle is "unsustainable"
Camilo Montoya-Galvez, Guest Author, Luis Giraldo
Fri, October 6, 2023 at 5:17 PM EDT·
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Washington — The unprecedented flow of tens of thousands of U.S.-bound migrants crossing Panama's treacherous Darién Gap jungle each month is "an unsustainable crisis," Colombia's ambassador to the U.S. told CBS News on Friday.
In September alone, more than 75,000 migrants crossed the roadless Darién jungle on foot, the second-highest monthly tally recorded by Panamanian officials, only a few thousand less than the 82,000 crossings reported in August. In total, more than 400,000 migrants, many of them Venezuelans headed to the U.S., have crossed that jungle this year to enter Central America, a record and once unimaginable number.
The flow of migration along the largely ungoverned Panama-Colombia border has fueled unprecedented levels of Venezuelan arrivals along the U.S. southern border, where American officials processed roughly 50,000 Venezuelan migrants in September alone, an all-time high.
"Irregular migration through the Darién Gap is indeed an unsustainable crisis that poses serious safety risks to all who attempt the trip — that is why Colombia, and the U.S. are working together to ensure that those who contemplate that dangerous journey do not take their first step," Luis Gilberto Murillo, Colombia's ambassador to the U.S., said in a statement to CBS News
https://www.yahoo.com/news/colombian-official-migrant-influx-dari-211725778.html
