Judge orders border closed to Venezuelan immigrants
BRASILIA: A Brazilian judge has ordered the border crossing f rom Venezuela closed to Venezuelan immigrants fleeing their country’s economic and political turmoil but the border remained open on Monday pending an appeal by the federal government.
Hundreds of Venezuelans continued to walk across into Brazil.
Federal judge Helder Barreto on Sunday ordered the border closed until the frontier state of Roraima can create “humanitarian” conditions to receive the massive and disorderly influx. But the injunction has not gone into effect yet pending an appeal by Brazilian government lawyers.
Over the last three years, tens of thousands of Venezuelans have arrived in Roraima, overwhelming social services and causing a humanitarian crisis with families sleeping in the streets amid rising crime and prostitution.
The state government on Thursday decreed Venezuelans seeking medical and other social services in Roraima would have to present a valid passport, which many of the refugees do not have.
Judge Barreto ruled that such a measure was “discriminatory” and countered Brazilian laws. He suspended a provision that would allow the deportation or expulsion of Venezuelan immigrants who committed illegal acts and ordered the vaccination of those admitted to Brazil.
However, he ordered the suspension of the entry of Venezuelans into Roraima until equilibrium between the arrival of migrants and their exit to other parts of Brazil.
Following recommendations by the UN refugee agency UNHCR, the Brazilian Air Force in early May began airlifting Venezuelan immigrants from Roraima for resettlement in other cities of Brazil.
To date, some 820 Venezuelans have been flown out of Boa Vista, the state capital, by the Air Force.