Nicaragua arrests 69 illegal Chinese immigrants

Managua, May 29: Nicaraguan police have arrested 69 illegal Chinese immigrants trying to get to the United States after the boat they were traveling in collided with another craft, an migration official said.

Police also arrested 14 undocumented Ecuadorean migrants who were on the other vessel, the officials said yesterday.

''We have 14 Ecuadoreans, seven women and seven men, and from China we have 69, 15 women and the rest male,'' a spokeswoman for Nicaragua's migration office, Magdalena Reyes, said.

The collision, which happened on Friday just off Nicaragua's largely undeveloped Caribbean coast, left five people dead -- three Chinese, an Ecuadorean and a Nicaraguan who was organizing the immigrants' passage.

Three other Chinese were still missing.

Reyes said officials believed the Chinese probably arrived via Hong Kong, Europe and Colombia. The Ecuadoreans also probably came up through Colombia, she said.

Repatriation of the Chinese or official assistance to them could be complicated by the fact that China and Nicaragua have no diplomatic relations.

Managua maintains formal ties with Taiwan, the self-ruled island over which Beijing claims sovereignty.

Chinese state radio earlier reported the arrests of 38 Chinese immigrants on the boat.

Reuters>