The Venezuelan exodus continues to increase and this year could exceed the number of refugees who left Syria due to a civil war

The Organization of American States (OAS) warned on Thursday that Venezuelan migration could reach 7 million people at the end of 2021 or the beginning of 2022, overtaking the exodus from Syria, considered the largest in the world, with 6.7 million refugees who have left this country.

According to a report released by the OAS Working Group on the Venezuelan Migrant and Refugee Crisis, “If there is no short-term political, economic and social solution, it is estimated that there could be more Venezuelan refugees than Syrians.”

More than 5.6 million people have left Venezuela since 2015, according to the report, which collects figures from the Interagency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela (R4V), created within the UN in 2018.

The document specifies that, despite the mobility restrictions imposed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, “The number of Venezuelan migrants and refugees continues to increase.

Before the pandemic, 5,000 Venezuelans have fled their country every day, but the impact of COVID-19 has forced more than 140,000 to return to their places of origin.

However, the report warns, from September 2020 to the present day, between 700 and 900 Venezuelans “flee daily by irregular routes: dangerous trails or maritime routes”.

“End of 2021 or beginning 2022, the number of Venezuelan refugees could reach 7 million ”, point to the document.

According to research, Venezuelans flee daily for five basic reasons: complex humanitarian emergency, human rights violations, widespread violence, collapse of public services and economic collapse.

In Venezuela, “9.3 million people, or a third of the population, are moderately or severely food insecure and in need of assistance”the report said, citing data from the United Nations World Food Program.

In addition, it represented more than 18,000 extrajudicial killings by state security forces or government-linked groups since 2014, according to OAS surveys.

By country, Colombia is the main destination for these migrants, with more than 1.7 million inhabitants on its territory, followed by Peru (1,050,000), United States (465,000), Chile (457,000) and Ecuador (431,000).

Other countries with strong Venezuelan migration are Brazil (262,000), Argentina (180,000), Panama (121,000), Mexico (102,000) and Dominican Republic (114,500), Trinidad and Tobago (40,000), Costa Rica (30,000) and Guyana (36,000).

The coordinator of this working group, also Venezuelan David Smolansky said in a statement that it was “the biggest exile crisis in the history of the region.”, and assured that today there are more than 5.6 million Venezuelan migrants and refugees. This number is equivalent to more than 18% of the Venezuelan population, the relationship narrows.

The 7 million migrants and refugees could be affected “To reopen the borders and deepen the crisis in the South American country,” the statement said.

Venezuela, Once an oil power, it is mired in an economic and social debacle that has worsened since President Nicolás Maduro came to power in 2013, whose legitimacy the OAS does not know, considering his re-election in 2018 flawed.

“The only solution for stopping this human landslide is the restoration of democracy and freedoms in Venezuela “, Sostuvo Smolansky.

(With information from EFE and AFP)

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