San Jose, Dec 26 (EFE).– Costa Rica’s Immigration Department said Saturday that a total of 56 Cubans who entered the country illegally will be deported in the coming days.

The Immigration Department’s press office told the media that those immigrants failed to obtain a Costa Rican visa legally and are being held in San Jose’s Hatillo district.

Since Nov. 14, Costa Rica has issued almost 8,000 transit visas to Cuban migrants who crossed the border from Panama. A day later, Nicaragua closed its border to those migrants, who were consequently left stranded on Costa Rican territory.

The government announced last Dec. 18 that it would issue no more transit visas and that whoever might be discovered in Costa Rica without such authorization would be deported.

Nicaragua closed its border to those migrants, universally headed for the United States, on grounds of risks to its security and the abuse of its sovereignty by its neighboring country, while also accusing Costa Rica of “provoking and manipulating” the situation to legitimize U.S. immigration policy, which awards great benefits to Cubans who reach that country.

The impossibility of Costa Rica to find alternatives for Cubans to continue their journey northwards led to its withdrawal from the political summit of the Central American Integration System, or SICA, on Dec. 18, when it announced that no more Cubans would be provided with temporary visas. EFE