Families fleeing Venezuela seek employment

SIR – The appalling violence witnessed against Venezuelan migrant camps in Brazil over the weekend (report, August 20) demonstrates the danger and futility of the world’s prejudicial stance towards economic migrants.

Reducing tensions between the migrant and host communities in the border town of Pacaraima requires a far more pragmatic approach than merely tightening borders. The solution lies in the provision of housing, employment and access to education for incoming families. This is the only way to lessen the impact upon social services, which is responsible for much of the community friction.

The nine government-operated shelters near the Venezuelan border are desperately overcrowded. There is an urgent need for housing for incoming families and education for children and adolescents. Plans to resettle Venezuelan families outside Pacaraima require expediting.

After four terrible years of recession in Venezuela, and with the bolívar so devalued that the monthly minimum wage won’t even buy a kilo of meat, to flee Venezuela was an imperative and not a choice for the 40,000 people attempting to build new lives in northernmost Brazil.

Without a joint effort between the government and local agencies, I fear we have not seen the last of the violence. Sergio Marques

Emergency Response Coordinator SOS Children’s Villages Brazil