About 40 migrants died and twenty were injured after the bus that was supposed to take them to the Costa Rica border went off the route early Wednesday morning in Gualaca, Chiriquí province, about 400 km west of Panama City. The driver from Panama was also killed in the accident.
The bus took foreigners from the Darién, the dangerous jungle bordering Colombia to the south, to a hostel that would take them in this western Panamanian city before continuing their visa-free journey to the United States.
The vehicle, which was part of the fleet organized by the government to channel the migratory flow, contained 66 foreigners and two drivers, one of whom died.
The vehicle was in an accident when it lost control on a bend and hit a rock and another vehicle very close to the shelter after driving for almost 14 hours to cover almost 700 kilometers.
Missing data
However, authorities have given different versions of the death toll.
“As we already know, the number of deaths is 40 foreign nationals,” Juan García, adviser to the National Migration Service, told Telemetro.
“There were foreign nationals of Ecuadorian, Venezuelan, Haitian and Cuban nationality on this trip,” he added.
However, prosecutors believe that the condition of the bodies means that an exact number cannot yet be given.
“This process will take some time, (…) the condition of the corpses and the lack of ante mortem data make expert opinions difficult, especially with regard to identification,” says a statement from the Institute of Forensic Medicine and Forensics. dependent on the prosecutor.
“For genetic comparisons, information from the migrants’ countries of origin is required,” such as fingerprints and dental documents as well as DNA samples from relatives, added the Institute for Forensic Medicine.
“We cannot give an exact death toll because this is a very complex situation and that means there is dismemberment” of the bodies of some of the deceased, Chiriquí’s chief prosecutor, Melissa Navarro, said in a statement transmitted to AFP from the press office.
“We as a public ministry have so far spoken about the removal of 37 remains,” Navarro added.
The Panamanian government has not disclosed the nationality of the deceased or the injured.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez reported on Twitter that “Cuban citizens” were among the dead.
Colombia and Ecuador also confirmed the deaths of several of their compatriots.
refrigerated truck
The accident also left more than 20 injured, who were taken to hospitals in David, capital of Chiriquí province, while the dead were taken to the judicial morgue in the same city.
A refrigerated truck arrived at the morgue on Thursday to store the bodies as its capacity has collapsed and identification will take a long time.
“The bodies are preserved with the dignity established by international standards,” the Institute of Forensic Medicine said.
The Panama Red Cross, which donated body bags to David’s morgue, said it was trying to contact families of the victims and injured.
“We are committed to restoring family contact so that relatives abroad can learn about their loved ones,” Leo Dan Berrios, Red Cross regional director for the Panamanian provinces of Chiriquí, Veraguas and Bocas del Rey, told reporters.
The dangerous jungle of the Darien has become a corridor for irregular migrants traveling from South America to the United States via Central America. On their journey, migrants must face wild animals, powerful rivers and criminal groups.
According to official figures, 248,000 people crossed the Darién in 2022, most of them Venezuelans. This year, 37,000 migrants have already crossed it, a fifth of them children.