Honduran authorities have revealed that they have detained five Syrian nationals who were allegedly trying to reach the United States using stolen Greek passports.
Officials said there was no indication the men were linked to last week’s terror attack in Paris, but they were detained late on Tuesday in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa, on arrival from Costa Rica. Reuters said the men were planning to travel to neighboring Guatemala and then the US.
The passports had been doctored to replace the photographs with those of the Syrians, police said.
“We received information from fellow police services that these five Syrians left Greece and passed through Turkey, Brazil, Argentina and San Jose in Costa Rica before finally reaching Tegucigalpa,” said Anibal Baca, spokesman for Honduras' police.
“They are normal Syrians.”
The US is riven by debate about the issue of accepting refugees from Syria. President Barack Obama has said he wants to accept 10,000 refugees from the country within the next year.
Many Republicans are opposed to his plans and the governors of more than 25 states have said they will not accept any such refugees. Campaigners have pointed out that governors have no legal right to refuse the migrants, but in there are many ways in which they can make it difficult for the new arrivals.
On Wednesday, it was reported that two families were redirected to Connecticut after the governor of Indiana, Mike Pence, said they would not be welcome there.
Reports that at least one of the Paris attackers was believed to have slipped into Europe among migrants registered in Greece prompted several Western countries to begin to question their willingness to take in refugees. However, others have pointed out that the passport may have been planted next to the body of one of the dead terrorists by the Isis fighters.
