(AFP) – President Donald Trump’s Homeland Security chief on Tuesday praised a US agreement with Panama on migrant repatriation flights and said Washington was ready to replicate it with other countries. Under an agreement signed last July by the administration of Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden, Washington finances the repatriation of irregular migrants who enter Panama overland from Colombia.
During a visit to the Central American nation, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the United States was willing to pay other countries to do the same. “The United States is more than willing to help share the cost of this, in order to make sure that these countries take their responsibilities seriously, to accept their citizens back home,” she told reporters.
More than 2,300 migrants have been deported from Panama on around 50 flights so far under the agreement. Noem observed the departure of one such flight Tuesday carrying Colombian migrants. She also met President Jose Raul Mulino and other senior Panamanian officials.
Last July, Washington pledged $6 million in funding for migrant repatriations from Panama. In May of this year, it said the figure had risen to $14 million. “Under President Trump, we’ve allocated an additional $7 million to Panama to repatriate illegal migrants and put an end to illegal immigration,” US Ambassador Kevin Marino Cabrera wrote Tuesday on social media platform X.
Hundreds of thousands of US-bound migrants have crossed the lawless jungle between Colombia and Panama in recent years, despite dangers including treacherous terrain and violent criminal gangs that kidnap and extort them. However, the number of arrivals fell sharply after Trump took office in January, vowing to crack down on irregular migration, sparking a wave of reverse migration to South America.
© 2024 AFP
