2023-09-08 14:38:39
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) delivered the report “Childhood in Danger”, in which it detailed that more than 60,000 children, half of them under 5 years old, crossed the Darién jungle in the first eight months of 2023, which constitutes a new record in child migration in the region.
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According to these figures, Latin America and the Caribbean now have the highest proportion of child migrant population in the world, with one in four migrants being a child or adolescent.
In 2021, the number of children and adolescents who crossed the border was 29,000, which rose to 40,000 in 2022. This figure has already been exceeded by 50%, with four months left until the end of 2023.
The report explains that migration in the region has experienced a dramatic change in the last decade, driven by factors such as gang violence, political instability, poverty and climate-related events.
“There are more and more boys and girls on the move, of increasingly younger ages, often alone and coming from various countries of origin, even from places as far away as Africa and Asia,” said the director of Unicef for Latin America and the Caribbean, Garry Conille.
In addition, the number of refugee and migrant children and adolescents detained at the southern border of the United States has also been increasing, with more than 83,000 children entering the country in the first seven months of fiscal year 2023, according to the Office of Customs and United States Border Protection (CBP).
This trend is reflected in other smaller migration flows across the region, as violence, instability and climate-related disasters drive more displacement and forced migration.
The risks to which boys and girls are exposed
The physical risks along irregular migration routes are countless, especially for children. In addition to the dangerous terrain they traverse – from jungles and rivers to railways and roads – children can also suffer violence, exploitation and abuse.
“My favorite part was leaving the jungle because it’s a nightmare in there,” said Angela*, an 8-year-old girl who walked through the Darien jungle in 2022. During the trip, Angela and her 10-year-old sister were separated from their parents and wandered lost for two days before meeting once more. The family traveled for more than 40 days to reach Guatemala before continuing to their destination.
The document also highlights that the proportion of children moving along the main migration routes in Latin America and the Caribbean has increased significantly in the last three years, with one in four migrants being a child, up from 19 percent in 2019.
This is rivaled only by sub-Saharan Africa, where children also make up 25 percent of the migrant population.
What is most worrying is that increasingly younger children are making these dangerous journeys, with children under 11 years old representing up to 91 percent of all children and adolescents traveling at some key transit points.
This new reality poses significant challenges to national migration policies and humanitarian responses in countries of origin, transit and destination. The physical risks along migration routes are countless, and children can face dangers such as violence, exploitation and abuse.
Unicef made an urgent call to raise funds to meet the humanitarian needs of refugee and migrant children and adolescents in the region.
It states that 160.5 million dollars are required to serve this population in several countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as an additional 142.31 million dollars for children and families on the migratory route through Central America and Mexico in 2023. Until August 2023, UNICEF had only received a fraction of these crucial funds.
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