On Tuesday, Panamanian Trade Union members took to the streets of Panama City to reject U.S. crimes against Latin America ahead of Secretary Anthony Blinken's two-day visit to their country.
RELATED:
The Ukrainian Crisis Should Not Mess Up US-China Relations: Qin
Besides declaring Blinken a "persona non grata," protesters burnt effigies of him and carried banners reading “Get out, Yankee assassins” to recall the 1989 U.S. military invasion and bombing of Panama.
They also condemned the arbitrary detention of Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab, whom U.S. authorities categorized as a terrorist and the disrespect for the rights of Latin American migrants.
In March, the United States Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) intercepted about 100,000 Latin American undocumented migrants on the U.S. border with Mexico.
About half of them were immediately expelled under the so-called Title 42 order, which considers the arrival of migrants a ´threat´ to health security amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Nevertheless, since the start of the Russian special military operation on Feb. 24, over 3,000 Ukrainian migrants have been widely welcomed by the United States government, which allocated US$1 billion funds to provide them with food, shelter, and medical assistance.
"Like Ukrainian refugees, we run from the violence. However, we don't receive the same treatment,” a Honduran migrant told Euronews and recalled that Latin American gangs' violence has considerably increased due to the economic recession prompted by the pandemic.