Masses of Migrants Overwhelm Panama’s Darién Gap
Record numbers of migrants are punching through the remote heart of Emberá-Wounaan jungle territory. When thunder claps in this dense jungle, indigenous people living along the banks of once-pristine rivers now brace for floods that wash up mountains of sodden garbage and at times, the bodies of dead migrants. The roadless Darién Gap was for centuries an almost impenetrable and pristine strip of land connecting what is now Panama and Colombia, inhabited by the indigenous Emberá and Wounaan people. Now, tens of thousands of migrants trek through each year on their way to the U.S., contaminating the local environment and deluging the small communities along the route.
June 2023, for the Wall Street Journal
Text by Santiago Perez
