Undocumented immigrants in transit worry Costa Rica

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Costa Rica has been dealing with a fresh immigration headache in recent years after it became one of the popular stopover countries for undocumented immigrants who ultimately seek to enter the United States illegally.

After arriving in Costa Rica, they stay there for a week or so, and then leave the country on a perilous journey to the United States through Mexico herded by immigration brokers.

These undocumented immigrants face violence, human rights abuses and killings by drug gangs or smugglers based in Mexico.

In August 2010, 72 people who sought to cross the U.S.-Mexican border illegally were found dead in a remote ranch some 90 miles away from the United States. The drug gang, Los Zetas, captured them and murdered them as they refused to work for the gang.

“Some of the immigrants in Costa Rica are economic migrants and some are refugee-seekers who intend to reach the United States or Canada,” Kattia Rodriguez Aaica, director general of immigration office of Costa Rica, told The Korea Times on June 24 at the Plaza Hotel in Seoul.

“The latter group is a main concern for us.”

Migrant workers account for about a tenth of the Costa Rican population, according to Jairo Lopez, charge d’affaires at the Embassy of Costa Rica in Seoul.

According to Araica, the nationalities of the illegal immigrants vary. Some of them are from other Central American countries, mainly Nicaragua, although in recent years immigrants from China, India, Bangladesh, Nepal and some African countries are also increasing.

Costa Rica is one of the Central American countries that are experiencing illegal immigrants in transit.

Araica said they pose a fresh policy challenge. “Immigration and migration issues require regional or international cooperation. Governments can share their experiences to help one another,” she said through an interpreter in a speech to the fourth Korea-Latin America Public Security seminar at the hotel. “We are here to learn from Korea. It has successfully managed illegal immigration and therefore is in a position to help us fight the new phenomenon of illegal immigrants in transit.”

Araica is one of the four Latin American officials who attended the immigration seminar. Other officials are from Honduras, Nicaragua and Paraguay. They presented their countries’ experiences.

Kim Young-june, commissioner of the Korea Immigration Service, agreed with Araica regarding the need for global cooperation to fight illegal immigration.

“Immigration policy requires global cooperation as illegal immigrants cannot be controlled without help from their home countries,” he said.

Kim said there has been a change in Korea’s status in immigration, stressing that the country used to be an immigrants-sending country but now is a receiving country. He said a rapid increase of migrant workers, exchange students, and the descendents of ethnic Koreans who migrated to China and Russia about a century ago were behind Korea’s status change in immigration.

He said 1.8 million foreigners or foreign-born people are now living in Korea, accounting for 3.5 percent of the population.

The figure marked 1 million in 2007.

A rapid increase of foreigners over the past eight years has encouraged the Korean government to come up with a set of measures for immigration.

According to the immigration service, 3.2 percent of people across the world are migrating from their home to foreign countries. People are migrating for diverse reasons — conflicts, wars and repression are some of the major driving forces it said.

Since it was first held in 2012, the Korea-Latin America seminar has served as a vehicle for sharing experiences in public security and immigration.

In a keynote speech to the seminar, Kim Hong-kyun, deputy foreign minister for political affairs, said that the rise of cross-border migration in recent decades was accompanied by an increase of transnational crimes and thus cooperation among countries was essential.

Kim said Korea and Latin America have expanded their areas of cooperation from trade to e-government, energy and the environment, and the seminar highlights immigration as a new area for bilateral cooperation.