Thank you for the question.
Costa Rica is definitely an important country in that it is receiving quite a few asylum seekers, and its system is now looking at how to deal with the increasing numbers.
It is true that there are more children and unaccompanied children who are now arriving in countries like Costa Rica, but the Americas traditionally have seen quite a significant number of children moving on their own throughout the region and making their way up to Mexico and then to the United States and sometimes, in some cases, to Canada.
The importance for countries like Costa Rica and other countries along the routes is to provide child-friendly protection services in terms of ensuring that those children have access to asylum and assistance as well. Increasingly we are seeing that children are undertaking much more dangerous routes on their own now, and part of the reason is that parents are unable to fund the travel of the whole family. We're seeing a lot more parents making the very difficult decision to send their children to safer areas. That perilous and dangerous journey up north is with the help of smugglers and sometimes with the help of traffickers.
Now UNHCR is responding, with the help of states and governments like Costa Rica's, to try to address these issues and is ensuring that the rights of those children along the route are respected and that they have access to services and assistance throughout the legal process they have to go through.