Ten migrants drowned in a flooded river near Panama\u2019s coastal community of Carreto while crossing the Dari\u00e9n Gap, Panama\u2019s National Border Service (Senafront) said Wednesday. <\/p>\n
Senafront did not specify the nationalities of the migrants or when they drowned. <\/p>\n
The agency said the case is still under investigation but suspects that transnational organized criminals and local collaborators led the migrants through unauthorized border crossings, putting their lives at risk. <\/p>\n
The Dari\u00e9n Gap is a mountainous rainforest region connecting Colombia in South America to Panama in Central America that is a crucial passage for migrants hoping to reach the United States and Canada. <\/p>\n
There has recently been an increase in the number of migrants willing to risk their lives and safety on the 66-mile (106-kilometer) hike required to cross it and the United States and Panama signed an agreement earlier this month aimed at closing \u201cthe passage of illegal immigrants\u201d through it. <\/p>\n
Since the beginning of July, Panama\u2019s new government, led by President Jos\u00e9 Ra\u00fal Mulino, has placed barbed wire across several routes in the Dari\u00e9n Gap, so that migrants who enter illegally through the border with Colombia are forced to use a single authorized entrance, according to the country\u2019s Ministry of Public Security. <\/p>\n
\u201cI will not allow Panama to be a path open to thousands of people who enter our country illegally supported by an entire international organization related to drug and human trafficking,\u201d Mulino said at his swearing-in ceremony. <\/p>\n
Senafront said the only authorized migration corridor is one that leads to Ca\u00f1as Blancas, \u201cwhere specialized patrols are available for their protection and humanitarian assistance.\u201d <\/p>\n
This is a developing story. More to come.<\/em> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ten migrants drowned in a flooded river near Panama\u2019s coastal community of Carreto while crossing the Dari\u00e9n Gap, Panama\u2019s National Border Service (Senafront) said Wednesday. Senafront did not specify the nationalities of the migrants or when they drowned. The agency said the case is still under investigation but suspects that transnational organized criminals and local <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5458,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5457","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}