Intent on “cleaning” its border region, Panamanian National Guard violently expels asylum seekers.

The sudden expulsion of more than 100 Colombians who had sought refuge in Panama’s Darien region, accusations of mistreatment and torture, and the separation of mothers from their children has caused alarm on both sides of the border.

There is concern for those once again exposed to persecution by Colombia’s armed groups as well as for the thousands of asylum seekers left behind.

"[The Panamanian government] doesn’t want Colombia’s problems spilling over onto our side of the border, so they’ve adopted a policy of deportations thinking this will solve the problem," said Manuel Acevedo, who helps Colombian refugees for the Catholic Vicariate of Darien.

Panama has mounted numerous mass deportations in recent years but none quite as shocking as that of the weekend April 18-21 when 109 refugees, including 63 children, were ferried in helicopters from the eastern Panamanian town of Punusa to the Colombian side of the border where they were dumped without food, water or shelter. Some mothers were forced to abandon their Panama-born children.

"There are allegations of mistreatment; there were threats, and there are families separated from loved ones," said Gerard Fayoux, head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office in northwest Colombia. "Two girls aged two and eight remained behind with Panamanian relatives but without their Colombian mothers; and a 13-year-old girl has disappeared after fleeing into the hills when the Panamanian National Guard unit occupied the town," he said.

Their ordeal began April 18 when officials from the government National Organization for the Protection of Refugees (ONPAR), accompanied by National Guard soldiers and numerous police officers, arrived by helicopter.

"They said they had come to help us, and that is what we believed," one expelled Colombian said, requesting anonymity. "It turned out to be a lie."

People tried to escape, some successfully, but most were led back to Punusa at gunpoint. According to testimonies, two young Colombian men were bound to a tree just outside the town for several hours and tortured. Their fate remains unclear.

The group was forced to clear an area of vegetation; supposedly so more helicopters could fly in humanitarian assistance. The army commander directing the operation, however, accused the Colombians of being guerrillas or guerrilla sympathizers and told them that paramilitaries were coming to kill them.

Finally, the authorities announced that the group would be repatriated and that the UNHCR and Colombian officials would be there to welcome them, a claim that proved false.

"They pushed us into the small one-room school where we were forced to sign documents," in some cases with guns at their heads, according to a refugee leader. The documents turned out to be declarations of voluntary repatriation.

Some were stripped of identity cards proving their refugee status. Carrying little more than a change of clothing, all were forced onto waiting helicopters, flown to an abandoned outpost in Colombian territory and left there as night fell.

The deportation was the latest displacement for these Colombians. All come from the northern edge of the Chocó province, where the country’s two dominant illegal armed groups, the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and rightwing paramilitaries, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), wage a territorial battle.

In 1997 more than 3,500 Colombians were forcibly displaced from their land when the Colombian Army, along with the AUC, carried out a massive operation in the Lower Atrato region of northern Chocó.

Many displaced persons have since returned to the Lower Atrato area, among them 2,500 members of the Cacarica self-determination community — a commune seeking to express its neutrality in the conflict. In December, fearing possible actions by paramilitary groups, 32 community members fled to Punusa, where they joined 77 others who had sought refuge there in 2001. The group of 32 returned to Cacarica just days after being deported; most of the remaining deportees have since joined the self-determination community hoping it will provide some protection.

Colombia’s Human Rights Ombudsman worries not only for the safety of all of those deported, but also for inhabitants of the Cacarica community.

"The return of the 32 in addition to the 70 or so other deportees could increase the risks faced by Cacarica. It’s a high-profile case because it’s known who’s arriving, why they’re arriving and where from," Miguel Angel Afanador, regional ombudsman, said. "It’s very worrisome because the AUC already have the community in their sights."

Since 2002, incursions by Colombian armed groups into Panamanian territory have left at least seven dead. On Jan. 18, four Panamanian indigenous people from Darién were killed by the AUC (LP, Feb. 26, 2003).

Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso and her Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe Velez, exacerbated this risk by accusing the civilians of links to insurgent groups. Moscoso denied any violation of human rights.

It is estimated that each day more than 1,100 Colombians are forcibly displaced because of the war. Most disperse to other parts of the country but some manage to cross into Venezuela, Ecuador or Panama.

The UNHCR says Panama contravened international accords protecting asylum seekers and has called on the government to cease such actions. But some are skeptical that the government will take heed. Acevedo said the Panamanian government is intent on "cleaning" the border region of Colombians, meeting the aim stated in the Panama Declaration by the presidents of various countries to apply international norms to combat the Colombian irregular armed groups (LP, April 23, 2002).

"It’s good to be returning, but now we don’t know what to expect," a leader of the Cacarica community said. "We were looking to live and work in peace and protect our families (in Panama), so now we’ll have to try and do it back here."

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