Surinamese delegation visits Brazil

Foreign Affairs (BUZA) Minister Yldiz PollackBeighle on Monday left for Brazil to discuss several things such as defense collaboration, police affairs, trade and investment. Minister Pollack-Beighle will also attend the regional talks of South America and the Caribbean where the refugee crisis will be discussed. Brazil on Thursday said it will declare a “state of social emergency” and boost troops on its border with Venezuela in response to an influx of people fleeing the crisis in that country.

The declaration will free the authorities to allocate “infrastructure funds and to put in place humanitarian measures” on the Venezuelan border, the government said in a statement. Neighboring Guyana and Colombia have also reported an influx of people fleeing Venezuela. Last week Colombia, which received 96,000 immigrants in November alone, tightened its border controls with Venezuela and sent over 2,000 troops to the area. But Brazil has no plans to close its border. The Brazilian government says that some 40,000 Venezuelans have now fled the economic breakdown and political unrest in their oil-rich country to take shelter in Boa Vista, capital of Brazil’s border state of Roraima. The Brazilian government has made it clear that it does condone the regime of Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro. The South American countries have made it clear that they do not want the United States of America to interfere in Unasur problems. But this does not mean that they do not approve of President Maduro’s plan to hold elections on April 22.