Can the Darien Gap be Sealed to Block Migrants?
A political plan to stop migration in the Isthmus of Panama raises concerns about potential humanitarian impacts.
By Jordana Timerman* (Confidencial)
HAVANA TIMES – The meeting point between South America and Central America is a narrow strip of land called the Isthmus of Panama, which connects to northwestern Colombia. It forms part of the Darien National Park and is covered by impenetrable jungle. In the geography of regional mobility, it has always been a natural barrier to transit between Colombia and Panama; the Pan-American Highway is cut off, and there is no road connection, which is why it is also known as the Darien Gap. Some call it “the route of death”: Until ten years ago, natural dangers and threats from organized crime were insurmountable for most travelers. The migratory flow towards “The North” had to pass through other routes.
But in recent years, since 2021, the area has turned into a sort of migrant highway. In that year, approximately 133,000 migrants crossed the dangerous jungle, the same number that had transited the isthmus over the previous decade. Since then, the number of migrants has grown exponentially: 248,000 in 2022 and more than 520,000 in 2023. The figures so far in 2024 indicate that the trend continues: almost 200,000 people have already crossed, and it is expected that the total number could climb to 800,000 according to UNICEF. This does not mean that the risks have gone away: at least 141 people died in the gap in 2023, probably only a fraction of the real mortality. Survivors tell of bodies stuck in the mud that likely slipped on winding paths and others drowned in treacherous rivers.
This week, the new President of Panama, Jose Raul Mulino, promised to seal the gap, so to speak. Although later, Colombian authorities said that the closure was not agreed upon bilaterally and expressed concern about the humanitarian impacts of this new policy. Mulino’s intention was to stop the migratory flow through the isthmus, a policy that began immediately with barbed wire on three of the main routes.
Perhaps more relevant is the agreement Panama signed with the United States on Monday as Mulino’s first act of government. It detailed the financial and logistical support Panama will receive for its migration operations, especially to deport people to their countries of origin. This is a significant change from Panama’s policy towards migrants until Monday. Before, it was to put them on buses and take them to the Costa Rican border to move on without further complicating the situation in Panama. It is worth emphasizing that migrants are charged for this mandatory service.
Mulino’s announcement was a diplomatic gesture towards the government of Joe Biden, for whom the migration issue has become an electoral nightmare in the presidential campaign. Furthermore, it is part of a regional trend of collaboration (willingly or in response to pressure) with the United States to stop migrants long before they can reach that country’s southern border. This is important in the USA because international law allows people who arrive to request asylum there — although the Trump and Biden administrations have limited this right in various ways. But experts consider it highly unlikely that the proposal — the details of which are still unknown — will be able to stop the migrant wave.
The Route through the Darien Gap: Restrictions and Organized Crime
Each individual has a personal story that pushes them to undertake the dangerous journey to the United States via this route, but the massive trend is due to a combination of factors: efforts by successive US governments to limit migration to its border and the enormous profit opportunities represented by people trying to get there. The growth of transit through the Darien Gap is related precisely to the imposition of visas in several Central American countries for people from countries whose citizens dominated migratory flows, including Venezuelans and Cubans. In many cases, it is not necessarily people who have just left their countries but those who have spent time outside their country and are looking to improve their living conditions.
Visa requirements stopped one way to get to the US: taking a plane to Mexico (or another Central American country) and then advancing to the border. But people who migrate are pushed by political violence, insecurity from organized crime, poverty, climate change, and, often, a combination of several of these factors. In that sense, experts point out that when one route is restricted, the flow, like water, increases in pressure until it finds another. When it comes to migration, alternative routes become progressively more dangerous. This, precisely, is the case of the Darien Gap.
“It has been seen that, when routes are closed, what happens is that people find routes that are often more dangerous and continue moving,” says Maria Jose Espinosa, executive director of the Center for Engagement and Advocacy in the Americas in the US, an organization that works on rights and migration issues in the region.
Juan Pappier, deputy director for the Americas at Human Rights Watch, agrees:
“Migration policies have been designed in recent years in the region that seemed to assume that the Darien Gap was impossible or difficult to cross. The Darien Gap was used to try to curb migratory flow, but it ended up pushing people to risk their lives there.” This also happened in the extremely dangerous crossings through the Mediterranean Sea, which were considered impossible. “What was achieved is that people risk their lives and that organized crime made millions and millions of dollars,” he said.
The case of the Darien shows how restrictive policies can fail spectacularly. The growth of the migratory flow in the area created an economic opportunity exploited by organized crime that handles the trafficking of people through the jungle. On the Colombian side, the Gulf Clan has capitalized on all aspects of migrant journeys, like a sinister travel agency. As with legitimate ones, migrants have several route options through the Darien with increasing financial costs to shorten the journey and access better conditions and equipment. The organization is such that these trips are managed through “agents” and migrants receive colored wristbands indicating which group they belong to.
“The Gulf Clan, on the Colombian side, controls the migrant routes and also the cocaine routes. So, in parallel, they do business with both, of course,” explains Pappier. “The Gulf Clan decides which routes can be used and charges the guides who help people cross. They also charge 20% of the profits from all those who benefit from migration, such as those who sell food. In return, they guarantee security.” In fact, migrants pay for each successive step they take on the migratory route, a series of extortions that leave many without money and even more vulnerable.
This mafia pax — security to guarantee extortion profits and drug trafficking — makes the route relatively safe for migrants.
“They make sure that the migrant routes used are not the same as the cocaine routes. They don’t want a high level of violence; they know it eventually brings the deployment of public forces. So, they maintain a low level of violence to do their business,” says Pappier.
But everything changes when crossing the border into Panama. There, the Gulf Clan stops dominating the situation, and migrants are at the mercy of Panamanian organized crime, which operates violently. Physical abuse to extort is common, including extreme sexual violence against women, such as gang rapes. Doctors Without Borders reported that violence against migrants on the route is increasingly brutal, and they assist an exponential number of victims, including children. Practices include the abuse of women in front of their families and children and the execution of uncooperative people. Humanitarian organizations are concerned about the growing number of minors crossing the Darién: In the first four months of 2024, more than 30,000 children crossed, a 40% increase compared to the same period last year. Almost 2,000 who crossed the jungle this year did so without a family companion.
Blocking Out the Sun with One Hand
Almost no one considers Mulino’s plan can effectively stop migrants from the Darién Gap.
“I honestly think it’s impossible to seal it. The flows are very large, and the gap is a jungle; history shows that other routes are opened,” says Espinosa.
Pappier agrees: “I think anyone who has been to the Darién Gap understands the combination of complex geography, lack of state territorial control, desperation, and the high number of people crossing makes it practically impossible to close it.”
The most likely outcome, they note, is that if such a measure is implemented, it will generate pressure on new, even more dangerous routes in a context that should already be considered a humanitarian crisis due to the number of people trying to cross it.
A Region in Motion
The fact is that the migration issue in the region is played out in relation to diplomacy with the United States, which under successive governments seeks to divert migrants before they can set foot on US territory. Under Donald Trump’s administration, this occurred with explicit pressure around trade policies. Under Biden, efforts have been made to open legal migration routes to prevent vulnerable people from making the journey undocumented. But that has proved not enough for the number of people seeking asylum, nor does it always apply to their particular situations. In the United States, the issue is highly controversial and a weak point for the governing Democratic Party. It is expected that if Trump wins the elections in November, agreements like the one Panama signed this week will increase. The question is, then, what new routes will migrants find?
*Article first published by Cenital.