A rainforest that was once a remote area is now packed with migrants trying to reach America: NPR
Colombian guides and migrants on foot and on motorbikes at the start of their journey through the Darién Gap. To get through the first mile, migrants can pay to ride motorbikes on muddy roads. But soon the jungle thickened, and they had to start walking.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Colombian guides and migrants on foot and on motorbikes at the start of their journey through the Darién Gap. To get through the first mile, migrants can pay to ride motorbikes on muddy roads. But soon the jungle thickened, and they had to start walking.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
DARIEN JUNGLE, Colombia – For centuries, mountains covered in jungle, swamps and venomous snakes scared people away from Darién Gap, the dense rainforest that separates North and South America. It’s still the only point where the Inter-American Highway, which runs from Alaska all the way to the tip of South America, melts into mud.
But thanks to the large number of migrants trying to reach the United States, Darién Gap is no longer an empty land.
In fact, when NPR first arrived in the area in September, the birdsong and the howling monkeys could not be heard. The main sound comes from dozens of motorbikes. The passengers sitting in the back are migrants from Haiti, Venezuela, Cuba, India and African countries. But since they don’t have US visas, they have to travel by land, first through South and Central America and then Mexico.
Migrants from Haiti are caught on a trail along the Acandiseco River, Colombia.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Migrants from Haiti are caught on a trail along the Acandiseco River, Colombia.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
The hardest part is crossing the roadless, 60-mile wide Darién Gap. To get through the first mile, migrants can pay to ride motorbikes on muddy roads. But soon the jungle thickened, and they had to start walking.
Gegrand Joseph, 44, a Haitian who hiked across the Darién Gap five years ago, was deported by the Trump administration and is clearing the jungle for the second time to head back to the US, said: “But there it is. there’s no substitute.”
Gegrand Joseph (front), a Haitian who walked through the Darién Gap 5 years ago, has been deported by the Trump administration and is clearing this same forest a second time to return to the US
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Gegrand Joseph (front), a Haitian who walked through the Darién Gap 5 years ago, has been deported by the Trump administration and is clearing this same forest a second time to return to the US
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Density of people passing through the rainforest
It will take a week on foot to reach the first village on the Panama side. The migrants brought overstretched backpacks, babies, cooking pots and water bottles. However, they do not seem to be discouraged. To get traction on a steep and muddy hillside, they crawl on their hands and knees. As the movement slows down, the flow of migrants causes traffic jams.
So far, this year more 100,000 migrants traveled the Darién Distance, more than three times the previous annual record, according to the International Organization for Migration. Many people used to work in South America but lost their jobs during the coronavirus pandemic and think that, under the Biden administration, they will have more opportunities to enter the US.
Haitian migrants at the beginning of their journey through the Darién Gap. To date, more than 100,000 migrants have crossed the Darién Gap, according to the United Nations migration agency.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Haitian migrants at the beginning of their journey through the Darién Gap. To date, more than 100,000 migrants have crossed the Darién Gap, according to the United Nations migration agency.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
That’s a lot of traffic for a forest famous for stopping it.
Although the Spanish explorers conquered most of Latin America, they stayed away from the jungles of Darién, which they regarded as the heart of darkness rife with yellow fever and malaria. Recent efforts by the US and Latin American governments to pave a road through the region and complete 19,000 miles Pan-American Expressway disbanded amid concerns about massive deforestation and the presence of guerrillas and drug traffickers on the Colombian side.
Some motorists have also tried
However, a few motorists closed the gap. In 1962, an expedition sponsored by a Chicago car dealership and armed with machetes, winches, and chainsaws attempted to drive three Chevrolet Corvairs from the Panama side to Colombia.
A Corvair is stuck in the Darién Gap, its chassis still rusting in the jungle surrounded by trees and vines.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
A Corvair is stuck in the Darién Gap, its chassis still rusting in the jungle surrounded by trees and vines.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
In a promotion movie, the narrator notes that “must struggle every mile of progress, step by step, inch by inch. Once again, the caravan must fight its way through the dark and narrow tunnels of stubborn Darien.”
One of the Corvairs was stuck and its rusted chassis could still be seen in the woods surrounded by trees and vines. But two of the cars made it to Colombia.
In 1972, a team supported by the British military managed to tow two Range Rovers through Darien Gap. On some days, the trucks were only a few hundred yards away and it took them 99 days to get through.
Narco, forest version
But the wilderness is slowly disappearing. On the Colombian border, I came across a bulldozer carving a path through the jungle. It’s illegal but there’s no police in sight. The area is controlled by a drug cartel called the Gulf Clan, which also makes a lot of money from migrants.
Migrants rest by the Acandiseco River after climbing muddy trails.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Migrants rest by the Acandiseco River after climbing muddy trails.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
At a campsite in the woods, Gulf Clan charges $50 per migrant to stay just one night. In the evenings, cartel members could hear commands barking at local hired workers, who responded like obedient soldiers.
All vehicles leave an environmental fee
The next day, about 700 migrants broke the camp and hiked into the forest trails, leaving behind plastic bottles, empty food containers and dirty diapers. Migrants drop into the river and throw their camping gear and clothes into the water.
Garbage and clothes are dumped by the Acandiseco river in the jungle of Darién, Colombia.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
hide captions
switch captions
Carlos Villalon for NPR
Garbage and clothes are dumped by the Acandiseco river in the jungle of Darién, Colombia.
Carlos Villalon for NPR
As he spoke, a woman recklessly dug three pairs of jeans out of her backpack and threw them into the river, said Justin LeFleuris, a Haitian who immigrated to the US.
Photographer Carlos Villalón, who was assigned to NPR and spent years covering Darién Gap, was shocked by how it changed. The two national parks in Darién are UNESCO World Heritage Site sites and areas are home to indigenous communities such as the Kuna, Wounaan and Embera, as well as many endangered species, such as the brown-headed spider monkey.
“It’s so sad,” Villalón said of all the trash. “You can’t drink water from the river. Two years ago, I drank from this very river, you know. This is not a wild forest anymore.”
Danger is a lot
But Claudio Madaune of the Darién Foundation, a Colombian conservation group, says the pollution caused by the migrants is insignificant compared to the damage done by illegal ranchers and gold miners who have moved in. this area.
The worst change, he says, is that Darién has become much more dangerous. Gunmen regularly rob, rape and kill migrants. Government officials from Panama and Colombia have discussed setting up a trans-Caribbean boat service to transport migrants between the two countries. That would reduce the risk and help protect the rainforest.
Forcing migrants to walk across the Darién Gap “is completely inhumane,” says Madaune.
But so far, nothing has happened. Meanwhile, the once desolate Darién was still packed with people.
