Rodolfo Noriega, from the Migrant Ombudsman’s Office in Chile, explained to ANSA that “the general crisis occurring in Haiti puts the lives of all the people in that country at risk.”
He added that the situation worsened after the assassination of its president Jovenel Moise the two attacks on the prime minister, the threats to the head of the Senate, as well as diplomats and others, which are part of the complex panorama that Haiti is experiencing, a country controlled by gangs that also manage the supply of gasoline, food, medicine and electricity .
Noriega said that the Haitians held at the airport “have the intention of entering the country.”
“Some have been there for more than a month and have applied for refuge, but the police are treating them as tourists, asking for a consular permit, which is ridiculous, because the consulate has not dealt with visas since the pandemic. It is also closed due to the situation from Haiti,” he explained.
In the opinion of the migrant defender, “they should be allowed to enter because when they arrived they made it known that they were coming because of the risk situation that every person in Haiti has.”
“Chile recognizes this, and has even brought a group of people. The representative of the United States in Haiti affirmed that it was criminal to return or repatriate people to Haiti,” he clarified.
The 23 Haitian migrants who are at the airport could not be repatriated because the courts determined an order not to innovate, after accepting an appeal filed in their favor.
Noriega emphasized that they have a residency application, with their valid identity cards.
“Many of them are those who were expelled from the US and others who were stranded by the pandemic. In their precarious Spanish, they expressed their intention to request refuge in Chile, noting that they come to seek safety in this country where they have family ties. and other roots, some are even parents of Chileans,” he said.
The migrant defender accused the Chilean Civil Investigative Police (PDI) of breaching “the Refugee Protection Law (Law 20,430) by preventing them from entering.”
Added to the above are the conditions in which they are at the airport, without access to a shower, meager food, without medical attention and without contact with their families, he said.
At the end of 2017 and the beginning of 2018, Chile suffered a migration crisis due to the arrival of massive flights from Haiti, but Noriega pointed out that today is not the same situation.
“They come as residents, not as tourists, and they sell them the round trip flight because the airlines ensure their return, the companies would not mind if they return them,” he said.
Noriega stressed that “the Haitians have sought to reach Chile in order to guarantee their safety and life, even more so after the closure of the border with the Dominican Republic.”
Haitians represent the third migratory population with 181,291 people, that is, 12.5% of the total of 1,462,103 foreigners who lived in Chile as of 2020, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics.
Source From: Ambito
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