Panama to transfer 3,800 Cubans to Mexico

By Nancy Caouette

MEXICO CITY

The government of Panama said Monday that it will organize daily flights to Mexico in order to transfer 3,800 Cuban migrants stranded in its territory.

Mexico and Panama elaborated on a plan last week to evacuate the Cuban migrants who have been stranded in Central America for several weeks, Panamanian officials told La Prensa newspaper.

The first flight would depart Monday from Panama City to Ciudad Juarez, a city in northern Mexico along the U.S. border.

“The Cuban migrants must pay for their air tickets,” said Jose Donderis, director general of Panama's National Civil Protection System the media outlet.

La Prensa added that Panamanian authorities would facilitate the paperwork and health certificates to prepare the entrance of the Cubans in Mexico and then to the U.S.

The Cuban migrants have been blocked in Panama since December as Costa Rica decided to close its land borders to Cuban migrants.

Between January and March 2016, Costa Rica organized several flights to Mexico to transfer about 8,000 Cubans stranded in its territory after Nicaragua closed its border last November.

Last March, Panama was forced to organize flights to help 1,300 Cubans reach Mexico and then the U.S. Official had insisted the operation would not be repeated.

But thousands more Cuban migrants have arrived to Panama in recent months with the hope of reaching the U.S.

Cubans have traveled for decades through Central America in order to reach the U.S. where they receive asylum if the enter by land as part of the Cuban Adjustment Act that offers refuge to migrants fleeing Cuba’s communist system.

But warming relations between the U.S. and the Caribbean Island has fed fear in Cuba that Americans could revoke the special policy.