Brazil, UNHCR renew deal on rights of Venezuelans

Brazil’s Social Development Ministry and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is renewing for another year today (Dec. 28) the cooperation deal ensuring the social and assistance rights of Venezuelan immigrants to housing and employment. The agreement has been effect since August.

During the first half-year of 2019, city authorities welcoming the immigrants will receive from the federal government a monthly $103 allowance for each person sheltered.

At the signing ceremony, the book Pátria Mãe Gentil (“Kind motherland”) was launched, with photographs showing the immigrants who were resettled as part of Brazil’s relocation initiative. The photos were taken by photographers from the ministry, UNHCR, the Empresa Brasil de Comunicação (EBC), and the president’s office.

Social Development Minister Alberto Beltrame said that Jail Bolsonaro’s administration will continue the efforts initiated by his predecessor. President Michel Temer, he said, did the right thing by not giving in to the pressure of those who argued for shutting national borders between Brazil and Venezuela.

“I believe Brazil provides the world with a role model when it comes to solidarity, humanity, fraternity—[concepts] so often found in addresses from leaders, organizations, and individuals, where actually this is not really the case. We, [on the other hand], bring these crucial concepts of humanity into practice by welcoming people who have today a new hope in Brazil, a new possibility of life, the renewal of dreams,” Beltrame argued.

Everything done under Operação Acolhida—“Operation Shelter,” as the resettlement program for Venezuelans in Brazil is called—confirms how much Brazil is bent on becoming “‘a kind motherland,’ as the national anthem says,” Beltrame went on to say.

Resettlement

Thus far, 3,602 Venezuelans are reported to have been sheltered under the initiative, and to live across 31 municipalities in 14 of Brazil’s 27 states.

UNHCR representative in Brazil Federico Martínez added that 5 thousand Venezuelans leave their country in search of better living conditions every day. “At the UN, 3 million are estimated to have left Venezuela, and nearly 200 thousand to have entered Brazil since 2017—approximately 98 thousand of them staying in the country, most applying for refugee status.”

Martínez suggested that program managers should revamp the initiative in 2018, trying to focus on providing Brazilian states with more balance, especially when it comes to the tasks linked to the assistance offered to Venezuelans. “The idea is to distribute this responsibility in a more humanitarian way, with other states and cities being given a chance to join in,” he argued.