This past week, 38 Haitian migrants who remained on the border line of Paso Canoas and in the Cuervito sector, were approached by officers of the Professional Migration Police, and transfers to the Temporary Attention Center for Migrants, CATEM, located at kilometer 20 of this canton.
These migrants would had been taken out of a temporary shelter in Panama after that country decided not to receive them. For this reason, the General Directorate of Migration and Aliens proceed to bring them into the country and lodge them at CATEM South, considering the vulnerable conditions these migrants were in, and also due to the situation of orange alert that the border canton maintains as a result of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
The 38 migrants were evaluated by Ministry of Health staff and isolated from the group of 167 migrants, including Haitians and other foreigners, who have been in this center since the border closings, obeying the sanitary quarantine order that must be carried out by everyone who enters the country.
“The conditions in which these migrants were, despite the solidarity by the residents of Corredores, exposed their fragile health. For this reason, their transfer is due not only to a solidarity response, but also to being part of the actions to prevent the possible spread of COVID-19.
“Furthermore, they will be in strict isolation during the quarantine period, in order to keep contagion at zero, meanwhile, the suspension of the controlled entry of Haitians by the immigration authorities of Costa Rica and Panama will continue in effect”, said Raquel Vargas, General Director of Migration.
