On the outskirts of Panama City, Panama, an old school has been turned into a shelter for dozens of asylum-seekers who were deported from the US two months ago.
The migrants sleep on mattresses in the gym and take Spanish lessons in the afternoon. They come from faraway countries like Afghanistan, Iran, Sri Lanka and Cameroon.
“We all escaped our countries because we had big problems,” said Nikita Gaponov, an asylum-seeker from Russia who said he was beaten by police in Moscow and threatened with arrest, because he is a gay man. “Now, we need a country that will receive us.”
In February, the US deported almost 300 asylum-seekers to Panama under a deal that has been widely criticized by human rights groups. Most of those migrants had crossed the US border illegally in January and early February. Many say they turned themselves in to US Customs and Border Protection and attempted to ask for asylum.
But instead of getting assigned to caseworkers who could evaluate their claims, they were detained and put on planes to Panama. Now, these asylum-seekers are in limbo because it’s not clear if they can stay in Panama, but it’s also dangerous for them to return to their home countries.
These migrants were removed by the US under section 212(f), a piece of the Immigration and Nationality Act that gives the president the right to suspend entry into the country for noncitizens.
“It’s a deflection of responsibility,” said Bill Frelick, the director of the division for migrants and refugees at Human Rights Watch. “The United States, under the Trump administration, is trying to shortcut due process.”
Frelick said there are contradictions in the law — recent additions say that US officials have to give asylum-seekers a chance to have their cases heard.
“At the end of the day, you could have a hearing, they could make their claim, they could be denied entry and they could be deported,” Frelick said. “But that’s not what happened in this case.”
Dangers back home
Many of the deportees in Panama say that returning them to their home countries puts them in peril.
Hayatullah Omagh, a data scientist for Afghanistan’s election commission, fled the country when the Taliban overthrew the nation’s government.
He said he decided to travel to the US border after he was unable to resettle in Pakistan or Iran.
“People who worked in the ex-goverment are still under persecution,” Omagh said. “For someone like me, to go back to Afghanistan is very dangerous.”
At first, the new arrivals were taken to a hotel where they were not allowed to leave their rooms, with Panamanian officers saying they wanted to “protect” the migrants from human traffickers.
Omagh said that Panamanian officers and staff for the International Organization for Migration tried to convince the migrants to accept repatriation flights.
“The second day, they came and they told us you have two options in Panama,” Omagh said. “You can go back to your country as a volunteer and if you refuse that, Panama’s government will send you back to your country by force.”
Some of the migrants accepted the offer, while the rest were taken to a remote camp on the edge of the Darien Jungle, where they had little access to the outside world.
“We didn’t have the phone, and we couldn’t go outside,” Omagh recalled, adding that if someone wanted to go to the bathroom, they would be followed there by Panamanian security officers.
Mohammad, an Iranian construction contractor, said that he can be put in prison if he goes back home. He attended an underground church in Iran and converted to Christianity recently, something that is punishable with at least five years in prison.
Mohammad, who asked that his last name not be published, said that one of his customers denounced him to authorities after a dispute over a $30,000 debt. That prompted him to leave Iran last year.
“I have a family, and I am very worried about my future,” Mohammed said.
An uncertain future
Panama, which isn’t used to receiving large numbers of asylum-seekers, has been improvising with the migrants, according to Frelick.
“Their assumption was that these people had exhausted their claims in the United States … and they would voluntarily return” to their home countries, Frelick said. “Some of them did, but there’s a group of people that did have refugee claims, and now, Panama is stuck with this group of people.”
On March 8, officials decided to release the migrants from the camp in the Darien Jungle, following widespread complaints from human rights groups, and dropped them off at a bus station in Panama City.
The previous day, Panama’s Security Minister said the migrants could apply for permission to stay in Panama for a maximum period of three months so that in the meantime, they could find another nation that would accept them.
Some of the migrants have since tried to apply for asylum at the embassies of different European nations, but with no luck so far.
Fe y Alegria, a Catholic group that runs education projects, has been hosting most of the migrants since they were dropped off in Panama City.
The organization owns the school where many of the migrants are now staying. There’s free internet access, three meals a day and the migrants are allowed to leave the school whenever they please.
“This was someone else’s responsibility,” said Rev. Marco Gomez, Fe y Alegria’s director in Panama. “But we are human beings, they are human beings, and we all have the same dignity.”
Some of the migrants staying in the school have said they will try to seek asylum in Panama.
But others hope that the United Nations can refer them to wealthier nations like Canada, the UK or Australia, which have better programs for asylum-seekers.
“We are not bad people,” Gaponov said. “We want to be humans, so that is why we left our countries.”