By Sovereign Hager

Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BOGOTA, Colombia-Three Colombian citizens and an Ethiopian were arrested and accused of running an international ring for trafficking Africans to the United States and Canada. Traffickers charged between $3,000 and $5,000 to take African citizens to the United States via Colombia.

The individuals in custody were charged with migrant trafficking, criminal conspiracy, and forgery of public documents.Johenes Elnefue Negussie, an Ethiopian living in Colombia with refugee status, is thought to be the ring leader. Negussie’s network allegedly has branches in the Colombian cities of Pasto in the South and Cartagena and San Andres in the North.

Colombia is considered a growing hub for people trafficking to the United States due to links to powerful drug traffickers. Two weeks ago, Marines rescued seventy undocumented Africans from the Caribbean, who later sought refugee status on Colombia’s northern coast. A member of the group told local media “we dream of arriving in the United States.”

Colombia deported 285 African and Asian citizens in 2009, and expelled forty-one other foreigners. The majority of migrants reaching Colombia are from Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Benin, Zimbabwe, the Ivory Coast, and Liberia. Mobile patrols have been set up at various points along its border with Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador and Brazil to end the flow of migrants.

Migrants arrive penniless, often ill, and in debt. The director of the Department of Administrative Security said that the migrants are “victims” that “deserve all the attention, respect and assistance from the Colombian authorities. But behind it lies a very elaborate network that seeks to create links with local drug lords for new routes.”

The director of a local rights group told the press that “its ironic that these people seek refuge in Colombia, one of the countries with the highest rate of displacement and asylum requests in other countries.”

For more information, please see:

Latin American Herald Tribune-Colombia Arrests Four for Human Trafficking-10 January 2009

AFP-Colombia Police Arrest Ethiopian for Human Trafficking-9 January 2009

AFP-Colombia, Neva etapa en el periplo de inmigrantes africanos hacia EEUU-8 January 2009