National Human Rights Council approves emergency recommendations on Venezuelan immigrants
The document was drafted from an assessment made by the mission that visited five cities in northern Brazil
Study and implement a plan to move the immigrants inland; adopt and draft assistance measures for the indigenous population; create an Emergency Immigration Management Committee; and provide adequate shelter and guarantee human rights at the Tancredo Neves gymnasium in the city of Boa Vista. These are the recommendations made by the CNDH (National Human Rights Council) on January 31.
Between January 17 and 26, members of the Council, of which Conectas is part, conducted a mission to three states in northern Brazil to make an assessment of the situation facing Venezuelan immigrants. The mission included visits to the cities of Belém and Santarém (in the state of Pará), Manaus (in Amazonas) and Boa Vista and Pacaraima (in Roraima), where most immigrants from the neighboring country are located.
In addition to inspecting the shelters, the mission also held meetings with civil society and international agencies that work at the sites and with public officials who are directly responsible and engaged with the issue, such as the Federal Police and municipal and state governments.
From these visits, it was possible to observe the lack of coordination between local authorities in dealing with the immigration situation and the urgent need to improve the system for receiving Venezuelan immigrants who come to Brazil to escape the humanitarian crisis underway in their country of origin.
“The mission served an important purpose in assessing and proposing solutions to mitigate the rights violations that we saw in the five cities. It is important to emphasize that recent proposals to close the borders to stop the entry of Venezuelans into Brazil would be a completely inappropriate and irresponsible measure. The Brazilian government has the obligation, provided for in the Immigration Law, to receive all immigrants in a dignified manner and this, obviously, includes the contingent of Venezuelans who are coming to the country every day,” said Camila Asano, coordinator of programs at Conectas and also one of the participants on the CNDH’s mission.
