(QCOSTARICA) The Government of Costa Rica is warning large groups of Cubans and other migrants from Colombia. The government is reiterating its position that it does not have the condition to allow them entry as it did in late 2015.
The continued closure of the border by Nicaragua to migrants and presence of some 2,000 African migrants currently in Costa Rica, has the contry’s resources stretched to the limit.
“The people and the Government of Costa Rica are respectful of human rights, protect the dignity of persons and are in solidarity with migrants, but the current conditions do not allow entry or possibly of settlement in national territory,” reads the statement issued by President Luis Guillermo Solis.
The government website said on Thursday, “authorities have put in operation processes attached to law, to apprehend and initiate subsequent deportation to their country of original all those who are in Costa Rican territory in irregular condition. The Government of Costa Rica urges the irregular migrant population not to enter the country in that condition.”
Last week, Colombia said it would deport all Cuban migrants found illegally in the country, in an effort to control its migrant crisis, reaching the South American country, which then moves north with their final destination being the United States.
Important to note that the migrant situation is not new, it has been ongoing for some years. What has changed in the past 10 months are two factors: one, a steep increase in the migrant flow, and two, Nicaragua last October closing borders to the migrants, becoming a bottleneck to a land transit corridor from Ecuador and Peru to Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico, that borders with the United States.
