Brazil’s President Michel Temer called an emergency meeting of key ministers Sunday after ordering troops to the border with Venezuela as regional tensions build over the exodus from its crisis-hit neighbor.
The move comes after residents in the border town of Pacaraima clashed violently with Venezuelan migrants, driving them out of makeshift camps in the town.
Temer was meeting at his presidential palace in Brasilia with key ministers, including those of defense, public security and foreign affairs, but no further details were being disclosed.
The situation in Pacaraima, on the opposite side of the border to the Venezuelan town of Santa Elena de Uairen, was calm early Sunday, partly because locals managed to force out Venezuelans living on the street since fleeing their country’s economic and social crisis.
“More than 1,200 Venezuelan migrants returned to Venezuela,” after Saturday’s violence, a spokesman for a Brazilian migration task force told AFP.
“The city looks deserted today, it’s very quiet because police reinforcements have arrived and the markets are reopening,” said a local in the town of around 12,000, who did not wish to be identified.
The public security ministry announced it was sending a contingent of 60 troops due to arrive Monday to join teams in the area.
Tens of thousands of Venezuelans have crossed the border into Brazil over the past three years as they seek to escape the economic, political and social crisis gripping their country.
The latest show of tensions began early Saturday, hours after a local merchant was robbed and severely beaten in an incident blamed on Venezuelan suspects, in Pacaraima, where an estimated 1,000 immigrants had been living on the street.
Dozens of locals then attacked the immigrants’ two makeshift camps and burned their belongings, forcing the Venezuelans back across the border. Shots were fired, stores were shuttered and debris littered the streets.
“It was terrible, they burned the tents and everything that was inside,” said Carol Marcano, a Venezuelan who works in Boa Vista and was on the border returning from Venezuela. “There were shots, they burned rubber tires.”
Roraima state Governor Suely Campos made a plea to temporarily close the border and asked Brazilia to send security reinforcements to “face the increase in crime” she links to Venezuelans in the region, particularly in the capital Boa Vista.
Meanwhile, Caracas’ foreign ministry called Saturday on Brazil to provide “corresponding guarantees to Venezuelan nationals and take measures to safeguard and secure their families and belongings.”
– Ecuador and Peru tighten controls –
Tensions are rising in Latin America over migration triggered by the crises in Venezuela and in Nicaragua, where President Daniel Ortega has led a brutal crackdown on anti-government protesters.
Peru and Ecuador are halting immigrants at the border by requiring them to present passports — which many lack — instead of simple identity cards.
Last week alone, 20,000 Venezuelans entered Peru, authorities say. The restrictive measures there go into effect August 25.
Colombia has said it fears that Ecuador’s border controls, which went into effect Saturday after the country declared a migration emergency, will leave thousands of Venezuelans stranded in Colombia..
An estimated 3,000 people cross every day from Colombia to Ecuador in the border town of Rumichaca.
The United Nations estimates that 2.3 million Venezuelans have fled the crisis looking for work and to escape poverty, while Colombia has given temporary residence to more than 800,000.
Peru, which has granted Venezuelans a temporary work permit for the last two years, estimates that nearly 400,000 Venezuelans have settled in the country over the last year.
Brazilian federal police, in charge of immigration, estimates that about 500 Venezuelans cross over to Brazil every day. In January alone, around 900 and 1,200 Venezuelans came to Brazil — a peak so far.
In the first semester of this year, around 56,740 Venezuelans sought to legalize their situation in Brazil requesting refuge or temporary residence.
Meanwhile, Nicaraguan migrants fleeing months of deadly unrest in the Central American country were facing similar difficulties.
In Costa Rica, hundreds of people took part in sometimes violent protests Saturday using Nazi symbols to repudiate Nicaraguan migrants.
Some demonstrators, carrying swastikas and shouting anti-immigrant slogans, tried to attack Nicaraguans gathered in the central La Merced park in San Jose, and clashed with police who tried to contain them, Security Minister Michael Soto said, adding that there were only some minor injuries. By AFP
