Statement in support of migrants stranded on the Chile-Peru border
On April 14, 2023, the Chacalluta-Santa Rosa border crossing between Chile and Peru was disrupted by a group of approximately 200 migrants who had set out on foot from Chile, intending to enter Peru. Carrying backpacks and their babies in their arms, they became stranded at this border crossing due to various circumstances. Since then, more people from diverse backgrounds, primarily Venezuelan, have joined the movement, desperately seeking to leave Chile after unsuccessfully attempting to settle in different regions of the country. They report having no alternative but to flee precarious living conditions, racialization, criminalization, and irregular immigration status.
The problem is that they have been stranded at the Concordia Line between the two countries, unable to formally leave Chile or enter Peru since then. Those of us who make up the CLACSO Working Group on Migration and South-South Borders We view this alarming situation with concern, primarily due to the unsanitary, insecure, and violent conditions in which entire families have been camped in the desert for more than three weeks. The media debate centers on the Chilean government and the Peruvian central and local governments of Tacna. Just as happened at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, when border closures left a significant number of migrants wanting to return to their countries of origin in a limbo that neither the country of origin nor the destination country wanted to address, these migrants have been experiencing a kind of temporary statelessness that reveals the indifference of states toward the rights of individuals as human beings. This indifference is aggravated when one considers that the irregularization process experienced by these people is caused, in most cases, by the closure and militarization of the border upon entry into Chile, by the increase in legal barriers to achieving regularity, and by the lack of recognition of refugee status for a population that experiences violence from the origin of their exodus, situations that more than justify the need for international protection.
Since the pandemic, the political climate in Chile has become increasingly hostile toward the undocumented migrant population, which is constantly associated with crime and increased criminal violence. These narratives from authorities and the mass media have permeated the general population, generating widespread rejection of migrants, backpackers, and Venezuelans, who are largely blamed for many of Chilean society's problems. The electoral process has further intensified these xenophobic, racist, and criminalizing sentiments—a tactic that, judging by the election results, appears to have been quite effective.
In addition to rhetoric, a series of legal initiatives have been introduced to reinforce this trend, such as the bills amending Law 21.325 on Migration and Foreigners of 2021. The first aims to expedite deportations by streamlining the notification process, and the second seeks to criminalize irregular entry. The first is a populist administrative measure that will cost the State millions of pesos (approximately US$5 per person deported). This initiative, proposed by President Boric and submitted to the Senate through the Ministry of the Interior and Public Security, was approved by the Chamber of Deputies on April 24, 2023, and is now proceeding to its third constitutional review in the Senate. The second bill is currently in its first stage, having been approved by the Chamber of Deputies on April 17, 2023, to criminalize clandestine entry into the national territory.
Added to this are the statements made by National Prosecutor Valencia on April 6, 2023, indicating that foreign defendants whose identity could not be established through national means would be subject to pretrial detention. National Prosecutor's Office Order No. 298/2023 was the primary input for a bill seeking to incorporate this measure into the Criminal Procedure Code. The proposal includes extending the detention period when the judge deems it necessary or to establish the identity or immigration status of the accused. Furthermore, it proposes that the accused be presumed a danger to public safety and, finally, that this same presumption apply to those who have entered the country clandestinely or maintain an illegal immigration status.
All of these initiatives aim to criminalize irregular migration, without considering that the primary agent of irregular migration is the State. For example, the service responsible for issuing visas has a backlog of between two and five years or more in evaluating applications for various types of visas and refugee status. Furthermore, these measures dangerously undermine due process and equality before the law, fundamental principles of democracies.
Peru's reaction has been no different from Chile's: immediately, on April 15, 2023, the Peruvian police established a barrier against this uncontrolled flow and declared a state of emergency. On April 27, 2023, the Peruvian government announced the deployment of 200 soldiers to reinforce the country's southern border and cover unauthorized crossings. The argument is that they cannot allow people to enter Peru who have not processed their exit from Chile at the border crossing. But what has happened is that they have not been allowed to complete the exit process; in fact, in some cases, people are not even allowed to approach the immigration control window. And in others, even with all the necessary documentation to leave Chile and enter the neighboring country, they have still been denied entry. Images of mothers with young children have been the most distressing in the media, as have those of families trying to cross the border by running—scenes presented as irrational acts, without showing the repression that fuels these desperate decisions. Police in Chile and Peru have repeatedly used beatings and batons against those attempting to advance or retreat toward one of the two disputed territories. They have reacted in the same way when these same organized migrants have blocked roads in protest, demanding freedom of movement.
Although a Venezuelan plane arrived on Sunday, May 7, transporting some of this population, the contingent measure does not change the underlying problem: the increasingly frequent scenes of outcasts of the State and the market who, in groups, caravans, or in solitary displacements, walk through the world fleeing precarity, violence and criminalization, and seeking recognition of the right to a dignified life, profusely declared by international legal instruments that can increasingly less disguise their rhetorical nature.
12 May 2023
CLACSO Working Group
Migration and South-South borders
This statement expresses the position of the Working Group Migration and South-South borders and not necessarily that of the centers and institutions that make up the CLACSO international network, its Steering Committee or its Executive Secretariat.
