Costa Rica has agreed to receive a group of 200 migrants from Central Asia and India deported by the United States, making it the second Central American nation to accept individuals from distant regions who entered the US unlawfully.
The first flight is scheduled to arrive this week, the Costa Rican government announced on Monday.
This follows a similar move by Panama, which last week received three US deportation flights carrying migrants from Asia, the Middle East, and Africa.
The initiative appears to be a new strategy by the Trump administration to manage deportations, particularly for individuals from countries where direct repatriation poses challenges.
Instead of keeping them in detention centres along the US-Mexico border, the administration is coordinating with nations willing to receive them, though the long-term fate of these migrants remains uncertain.
During his recent visit to Central America and the Caribbean, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio secured commitments from several governments, including Panama and Costa Rica, to collaborate on migration issues. However, specifics about these agreements were not disclosed.
In a statement on Monday, the Costa Rican government confirmed that the first group of deportees would be arriving on a commercial flight Wednesday afternoon.
The government emphasized that its role would be to act as a “bridge” for the migrants’ eventual return to their home countries.
The repatriation process, according to Costa Rica, will be “fully funded by the US government, under the supervision of the International Organization for Migration,” a United Nations agency responsible for overseeing the migrants’ care during their temporary stay. Panama has described a similar arrangement for those it has received.
Representatives of the UN agency in Costa Rica have yet to respond to requests for comment.
Upon arrival at the primary airport serving San José, the capital, the deportees will be transferred to a migrant shelter in the southern region of Corredores.
However, Costa Rican authorities have not specified how many migrants they anticipate receiving in total or how long they will remain in the country before being repatriated.
Costa Rica has previously faced difficulties managing large numbers of migrants travelling through its territory en route to the US border.
At one point, its shelters were overwhelmed with individuals who had traversed the treacherous Darién Gap, a dense jungle passage between Colombia and Panama.
Over the past year, however, the number of migrants passing through Costa Rica has significantly declined due to stricter immigration controls enforced by the United States, Mexico, and Panama.
(The New York Times)
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