Around 1,000 Cubans aiming for US stuck in Costa Rica

Around 1,000 Cubans aiming for US stuck in Costa Rica

San José (AFP) - About 1,000 desperate Cubans on an exhausting odyssey
through South and Central America to the United States are stuck in
Costa Rica with many risking deportation, authorities and the migrants
said Thursday.

Many of them are too broke to pay farther passage north, having
exhausted their funds by flying from Cuba to Ecuador then traveling
overland through Colombia, then paying bribes to go by small boast to
Panama and then over the land border into Costa Rica.

More than 100 of them are staying in streets close to Costa Rica's
migration office in the capital San Jose, and nearly 1,000 are stuck in
a border town unable to pass through passport control because they don't
have a visa.

America has a longstanding policy of accepting Cubans who set foot on
its soil.

In an effort to get past the US Coast Guard, which would return them to
Cuba if caught on water, many now try to enter via Central America and
then Mexico -- the same route used by mainland Latino migrants.

But increased security along the southern US border and boosted
vigilance in Mexico have made that passage more difficult.

Images by Costa Rican television news channel Telenoticias showed the
Cubans in the southern Costa Rican border town of Paso Canoas
demonstrating to ask they be permitted to continue their journey.

"We are chasing our dreams," read one placard held by a Cuban.

Another, Rosalis Taguada, told the channel that "we have risked our
lives to make it to Costa Rica -- it's difficult for a mother to subject
her daughter to this, but it is more difficult to remain in that country
(Cuba)."

The head of Costa Rica's Migration Service, Kathya Rodriguez, told
reporters that the Cubans already in San Jose could soon be taken north,
to the border with Nicaragua, if their papers were in order.

But those on the southern border with Panama would be sent back to that
country if they were deemed to have crossed over illegally.

"In that case, we will conduct the process directly with Panama because
it's obvious these people entered from Panama," she said.

"I don't know what sort of migration processing Panama is doing" with
the Cubans, she added.

This week, Costa Rican police busted a migrant-smuggling ring that
worked to take unauthorized migrants, mainly Cubans, through the country
to the Nicaraguan border.

Source: Around 1,000 Cubans aiming for US stuck in Costa Rica - Yahoo
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