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Migrants by a banner that reads ‘Welcome to Costa Rica’ in an encampment of Africans in Peñas Blancas, Guanacaste, Costa Rica, on the border with Nicaragua last month.
Migrants by a banner that reads ‘Welcome to Costa Rica’ in an encampment of Africans in Peñas Blancas, Guanacaste, Costa Rica, on the border with Nicaragua last month. Photograph: Ezequiel Becerra/AFP/Getty Images
Migrants by a banner that reads ‘Welcome to Costa Rica’ in an encampment of Africans in Peñas Blancas, Guanacaste, Costa Rica, on the border with Nicaragua last month. Photograph: Ezequiel Becerra/AFP/Getty Images

Costa Rica expects asylum claims to quadruple as refugees head south

This article is more than 7 years old

People are fleeing violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras for their stable and prosperous neighbour – hailed as a ‘champion’ in managing migration

Asylum claims in Costa Rica are set to quadruple this year from 2014 as stricter controls in Mexico and the US force Central Americans fleeing violence and political instability to find new migration routes.

Tens of thousands of Central Americans from the “Northern Triangle” countries of El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala have fled their homes in recent years to escape violent criminal gangs who regularly target civilians for murder, rape and extortion.

While most of this migrant flow still heads north, some refugees have found homes elsewhere on the Central American isthmus.

While Belize and Panama have also seen spikes in migration, Costa Rica, one of the most politically and economically stable countries in the region, has become an attractive alternative for Central American refugees.

Now, the country is going one step further, following the announcement of a new scheme to offer temporary protection to refugees from the Northern Triangle.

Under the new protection transfer agreement (PTA), Costa Rica will accept up to 200 prescreened refugees for periods of up to six months, while their US asylum applications are processed. Migrants who arrive in Costa Rica before applying will not be considered for US asylum.

Though only a small number of migrants will benefit from the project, it marks a significant change in the international response to fleeing Central Americans, who were previously considered primarily as economic migrants, unqualified for refugee status.

“It is a shift in the way both the US and the region are looking at the outflows from the Northern Triangle,” said Faye Hipsman, a policy analyst with Washington-based thinktank Migration Policy. “This is a recognition that people in the Northern Triangle are facing true refugee circumstances and can’t stay in their countries.”

The PTA will be the first time in recent Latin American history that a third country will offer temporary protection to refugees.

The United Nations refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration will assume all costs associated with the project, and if it is successful, organizers hope to broker similar agreements with other countries throughout the region.

The announcement is also significant for Costa Rica, which along with managing the spike in asylum applications from the Northern Triangle has found itself at the center of two separate migrant crises, following a border crackdown by its northern neighbor, Nicaragua.

After the closure stranded nearly 8,000 US-bound Cubans in the country late last year, the government housed them in shelters while it brokered an airlift with its regional allies.

With Nicaragua now blocking the entry of more than 2,000 extra-continental migrants from Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, Costa Rica has again promised the migrants safe passage and offered applications for asylum and spots in several shelters throughout the country.

“We consider Costa Rica a champion in managing immigration and an example for the region,” said Carlos Maldonado, the UNHCR chief in Costa Rica. “Human rights has always been one of Costa Rica’s key trademarks and the country’s government, people and civil society have acted admirably when faced with these migrant flows,” he added.

Though on its own the PTA will not be bringing Central American refugees to Costa Rica permanently, some experts believe that the agreement and the country’s other refugee-friendly policies could encourage more migrants to try moving south.

“It is hard to imagine that the country accepting two hundred people for transfer would change the flow significantly,” Hipsman said, “but the fact that Costa Rica is publicly accepting refugees for processing could signal to would-be refugees or migrants that it might be a more welcoming place.”

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