Panama says it has recaptured Chinese woman who escaped from a hotel holding deportees

PANAMA CITY (AP) — Panamanian authorities said they recaptured a woman who had escaped confinement from a Panama hotel where she and nearly 300 deportees from the United States were being held as they awaited repatriation to their countries on Wednesday.

Earlier in the day, Panama’s National Immigration Service said they were searching for a Chinese woman, who had received assistance in breaking out from people loitering around the hotel. It said it asked the alleged collaborators to return the woman, warning that they could face human trafficking or migrant smuggling charges.

It comes after the Panamanian government received sharp criticisms on Tuesday as images began to circulate of some of the 299 migrants detained at the hotel, who under police guard and barred from leaving, held up notes from their windows reading things like “please help us” and “We are not safe in our country.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Security Minister Frank Abrego wrote on a post on social platform X that she was found abandoned near a migrant processing facility along the northern Panama-Costa Rica border, a high-transit point for migrants headed toward the U.S. While it was not clear if she was found in Panama or in Costa Rica, he blamed her brief escape on "human traffickers."

The deportees, primarily from Asian countries, are in a sort of limbo in Panama after the Central American nation agreed to serve as a transit point for migrants who are hard for the Trump administration to deport directly to their countries.

Around 40% of the deportees have said they would not voluntarily return to their countries of origin, raising questions about how long they would be detained in the hotel. The situation has fueled sharp criticism of the Panamanian government, despite its claims, disputed by evidence, that the migrants are not detained.

Security Minister Frank Abrego said on Tuesday that 171 of the migrants have agreed to return to their countries of origin, although he did not provide a specific timeline. He also noted that an Irish citizen had already been repatriated.

The remaining migrants would be sent to a temporary migration facility near the Darien Gap, a heavily forested region along the Colombian border, until it's clear where they will be sent. The region has historically been used by migrants from Venezuela and other countries to travel north to the U.S.

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