When Mafer González set foot on land after a gruelling 10-hour boat journey from the Colombian island of San Andrés final October, she mentioned it felt like her soul had returned to her physique.
González and the 17 different Venezuelan migrants who’d crossed the Caribbean waters to Nicaragua in a small fishing boat had been fortunate — the climate had been gentle and the ocean comparatively calm. But the pace at which they had been travelling for a part of the journey made her concern for her life and people of her two kids, ages three and 6.
“The boatman advised us to crouch down and hug one another in order that nobody would fall out,” the 30-year-old Venezuelan mentioned. “We had been like this till we could not see the lights from San Andrés anymore.”
They’d left the island by boat at 9 p.m. on a stiflingly heat night, having every paid substantial sums of cash to smugglers for passage to Corn Island, Nicaragua.
All had been heading to the U.S., the place they hoped they’d discover a higher future.
A decade-long financial and humanitarian disaster in Venezuela has led to low wages and the close to collapse of public providers and well being care. Practically eight million residents — 1 / 4 of the inhabitants — have left for different international locations.
San Andrés usually lures vacationers with its white sand seashores and turquoise waters, however it’s additionally a part of what’s change into often known as a “VIP” route for asylum seekers and migrants.
These with the monetary means who aren’t eligible for visas to enter international locations north of Colombia can use the path to keep away from strolling throughout the Colombia-Panama border — a treacherous jungle space known as the Darién Hole — shaving weeks off their journeys to the U.S.
However the clandestine journey exposes determined individuals to unpredictable climate, ferocious seas and a profitable but harmful underworld the place a whole bunch of individuals have needed to be rescued at sea and dozens of others have vanished.
‘VIP’ packages promoted on social media
Colombia has lengthy been a preferred vacation spot for a lot of migrants as visa restrictions there and in different South American international locations are extra lax than in Central America.
Social media and phrase of mouth have change into key instruments for these wanting to find routes to the U.S. and join with smugglers. Digital flyers, route particulars and tariffs flow into in migrant Fb teams.
A grainy TikTok video shot in a airplane advertises the San Andrés to Nicaragua boat route and encompasses a girl’s voice saying the journey is “100 per cent beneficial.” The publish, dated Sept. 5, 2024, has greater than 17,000 views and dozens of feedback in Spanish asking for costs and extra info.
Whereas migration is not against the law, trafficking migrants is — and passengers are sometimes put in excessive hazard. But it surely’s a profitable trade, and for smugglers the dangers are outweighed by the good-looking sums of cash migrants are keen handy over.
Venezuelan Dennis Armando Paredes paid $2,600 US ($3,524 Cdn) for a journey from Bogotá, Colombia, to southern Mexico, by way of San Andrés.
Costs usually begin at $1,300 US ($1,762 Cdn) for journeys to Nicaragua and rise for longer distances. Some nationalities, comparable to Chinese language and Afghans, are charged significantly extra — typically as much as $6,000 US ($8,130 Cdn.)
In 2017, amid the humanitarian disaster in Venezuela, Paredes migrated to Peru the place he met his Peruvian spouse, Nelly Durán.
There, the pair ran a profitable fast-food enterprise, however mentioned they had been being extorted by an area gang who advised them they’d must pay the cash for safety causes.
They noticed the U.S. as a secure place the place they might work and begin a household. Since Durán, a Peruvian nationwide, may fly on to Mexico and not using a visa, they deliberate to reunite there after Paredes took the San Andrés route.
Though San Andrés belongs to Colombia, it is geographically nearer to Nicaragua — simply 100 miles west of Corn Island.
It is typically marketed as a faster and safer various than mountaineering the Darien Hole, the place migrants are weak to robberies, wild animals and powerful river currents.
“They advised us that it was a secure route, that it was a VIP route, that in three hours he’d arrive in Nicaragua,” Durán advised CBC Information.
In actuality, the crossing takes for much longer, and regardless of the route being promoted as safe, Paredes by no means arrived.
Hazard, despair and disappearances
The primary time Paredes tried the crossing, the boat he was on was picked up by the coast guard in stormy climate. He was despatched again to Colombia’s capital of Bogotá and advised he would not be allowed to return to San Andrés.
However a couple of days later — after his smuggler bought him a pretend ID — he returned to the island and tried the crossing once more.
The Colombian Navy has rescued 224 individuals to this point in 2024 making an attempt to succeed in Nicaragua from San Andrés — though it is unknown what number of have made the journey efficiently.
Individuals have been present in boats, floating within the water and deserted on small islands. Final 12 months, The determine was 453 for the entire of 2023.
“We have needed to rescue infants — simply months previous — from individuals’s arms,” mentioned Colombian Navy Captain Guillermo Lozano, who’s in control of operations towards unlawful actions, together with drug and migrant trafficking within the waters of San Andrés.
On the coastguard station on San Andrés, he confirmed CBC Information that the boats aren’t often licensed or secure sufficient to hold passengers and sometimes do not have life jackets.
“Typically, they use artisanal fishing boats that are not greater than two metres huge,” Lozano defined, pointing at a number of seized boats. He mentioned many of the boats carry 22 to 30 individuals every.
There have been 42 individuals on the boat Paredes used, based on the Colombian Navy.
A ultimate name
On Oct. 21, 2023, Durán briefly spoke to her husband, who advised her he was ready by a bonfire on the fringes of the San Andrés shoreline.
“His mother and father wished to say goodbye, too, however he lower the decision brief as a result of he mentioned they’d been advised telephones weren’t allowed,” she recalled. “He advised me he’d attempt to contact me discreetly as they set off.”
They ended their name at 6:45 p.m., and that was the final time Durán heard from her husband.
The subsequent day, she bought a name from the smuggler saying the boat had disappeared — 40 passengers, together with Paredes, and two crew had merely vanished.
“I went into shock. I assumed it was some horrible joke,” Durán mentioned. “I can actually say it was the worst day of my life.”
Neither the boat, nor any of the individuals on board have ever been discovered. Durán and different households consider this implies kidnapping was concerned, and that their family members are nonetheless alive.
The Legal professional Common’s Workplace has been investigating completely different theories about what occurred to the boat, however say that to this point, the proof they’ve factors to a shipwreck.
Crime and corruption
Investigating and placing an finish to boat disappearances, shipwrecks and the final migrant trafficking networks has been made extra complicated because of corruption on the island.
González says as her group was ready in a small, darkish home to go away San Andrés, three law enforcement officials arrived.
“They advised us we needed to give $100 per individual, in any other case they’d deport us — and even take our children off us.”
The Legal professional Common’s Workplace in Colombia advised CBC Information that there’s “little doubt” public officers have been concerned within the trafficking of migrants.
In response to the Legal professional Common’s Workplace, the radar utilized by the navy that detects boats within the water was typically turned off when migrant boats had been leaving the island, or could be reported as broken. They mentioned the radar was supposedly not functioning the night time the boat Paredes was on went lacking.
In December 2023, the Legal professional Common’s Workplace introduced the dismantling of a migrant trafficking community that resulted within the arrest of 24 individuals. The official with the Legal professional Common’s Workplace later confirmed to CBC Information that a minimum of three of these arrested had been members of the Colombian Navy.
Whereas officers say corruption throughout the navy make rescues tougher, so too does the always altering nature of the migrant enterprise.
“They’re at all times evolving their methods,” mentioned Lozano, the navy captain, of the traffickers. “They’re adapting different measures so they don’t seem to be detected.”
When González arrived within the U.S. in December, she and her kids made their strategy to Chicago, the place she discovered a job. As they get used to their new lives, she looks like she and her household will lastly have the higher future she wished.
However she would not hesitate when requested if she would suggest the San Andrés path to anybody else.
“No,” she mentioned. “It is tough, very tough.”
González is aware of that she and her kids had been lucky to make it to the U.S. safely, whereas others have not been as fortunate.
“It is a danger that you simply take with out figuring out the way it will prove.”