Migration towards the US through a perilous but increasingly well-trodden rainforest border crossing has ground to a halt after the Colombian navy arrested two boat captains for trafficking migrants.
But the attempt to stop movement through the Darién Gap between Colombia and Panama has left more than 3,000 people stranded in two remote Caribbean towns, where officials fear the bottleneck could cause a public health emergency.
In the town of Necoclí, normally a way station on the journey north, the secretary of government, Johann Wachter, said that as many 1,000 people were now waiting for boats to resume their normal ferry service across the Gulf of Urabá.
“Necoclí is a city with limited capacity,” said Wachter. “We’re trying to mediate, because obviously we’re worried that having so many people could ultimately end up affecting public order.”
Wachter said the Colombian coast guard arrested two boat captains last week on charges of migrant trafficking, because they were carrying about 150 passengers without appropriate documents. Necoclí’s two main boat companies then suspended their services while they appealed to local authorities for assurances that they were not facing a broader crackdown.
It was unclear whether the arrests were isolated incidents or the result of a change of policy by the government of Colombia, which along with other countries in the region, has been under growing pressure from the US to rein in migration.
Migration is set to be a key and divisive issue in this year’s US presidential elections. Both Joe Biden and his likely rival, Donald Trump, were in Texas on Thursday visiting America’s southern border with Mexico.
Across the region, the scale of the problem has spiralled in recent years, with about 520,000 migrants crossing the Darién in 2023, up from 24,000 in 2019. Most who trek the Darién are fleeing Latin American countries embroiled in political and economic crises such as Venezuela, Ecuador and Haiti but migrants come from as far as Africa and China.
The Darién Gap is a lawless strip of jungle connecting Colombia with Panama. While the Colombian side of the border is tightly controlled by local organized crime factions, travellers are routinely targeted for robbery and rape when they cross into Panama.
Two hundred and fourteen cases of sexual violence were recorded in the Darién Gap in December 2023 – seven times the monthly average recorded between January and September last year.
But for many migrants fleeing violence, persecution or economic hardship, hiking through the dense, mountainous rainforest still offers the best possible route towards the US.
And despite the deaths of about 50 migrants on the route last year, migration numbers have repeatedly broken records since the pandemic, with half a million migrants trekking the Darién in 2023.
Migrants usually take boats from Necoclí or nearby Turbo across the Gulf of Urabá to reach the foot of the Darién Gap where they pay about $350 to guides who lead them through to Panama.
But since boat transport across the Gulf came to a halt, as many as 3,500 people have been left stranded, with at least 850 sleeping in the beach or streets, the United Nations Refugee Agency said on Thursday.
Romely Pérez, 26, her husband and children aged eight, five and two, had expected to stay just a few days in Necoclí, but the Venezuelan family have now been sleeping in their two-person tent on the town’s beach for more than a week. Pérez said the family could not afford to spend any of their savings which they had borrowed and saved to pay their way through the Darién.
Her children can sometimes eat free at a local charity, and she was washing dishes at the back of a beachfront restaurant, in exchange for a lunch plate to share between her and her husband.
“This is not life here,” she said. “The idea is that one should be moving forward, not stuck in one place,” she said. “It’s horrible to live like this.”
