Nicaraguan Refugees / Antonio Olmos

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In January 1989 when a democratically elected government replaced Sandanista Rule in Nicaragua, The United States ended political asylum requests from Nicaraguan Immigrants.

The USA announced the change three months before it was to take effect. This led to a rush of migrants seeking to reach the United States before the change took effect.

Together with a reporter, Antonio Olmos followed a group of Nicaraguan refugees as they made their way through Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico to reach the United States border at Texas.

The refugees dodged thieves, Narco traffickers, weapons smugglers and border police as they made their way north in small vehicles, buses and on foot. Each international frontier was crossed on foot illegally at night. It took four weeks to reach the United States where the group crossed the Rio Grande near Brownsville Texas. The group of forty-two Nicaraguans then broke up and made their separate ways to various cities in the USA where families, friends and jobs awaited.

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About Antonio

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Antonio arrived in London in 1994, by way of Mexico and California. He has worked extensively in the Americas, the Middle East and Africa; for newspapers and magazines around the world as well as leading NGOs and corporates.

“I try to make photographs that will engage the viewer and if that means using what many call beauty so be it. If you want people to listen through photography, you must engage the viewer, to get them to notice, to look, to pay attention.”

(To read more about Antonio Olmos, see Who we are)

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