Carmen Díaz, a fictitious name for security reasons, was one of the many Venezuelans who crossed the border to work in another country and be able to periodically send money to her relatives in Barquisimeto. She got a job in a shoe store in Cúcuta until the Colombian authorities decreed a quarantine in response to the Coronavirus. Given the uncertainty and her few savings, she decided to return to Venezuela with her baby. She paid to cross through a trail into San Antonio del Táchira, where she had a medical check-up to rule out any symptom. She bought an overpriced bus ticket for the state of Lara. The trip took 17 hours, 5 more than usual due to multiple checkpoints. At one post near Barquisimeto, the officers informed the passengers that since they came from the border, they had to go to a “Retention Center” so that they could be examined and serve some days of isolation. That place in the Bolivarian Villa of Barquisimeto was not directed by medical personnel but the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB). Due to deprivation, friction began between people and military officers. When they complained about the conditions of the place, one of the GNB officers yelled at Díaz: “No one told you to leave the country! Who the fuck told you to leave this shit, damn it! ” According to Carmen Díaz’s testimony, since they arrived at the center they have been made to feel guilty about something, that she does not understand very well.

The mistreatment of Venezuelan migrants by local officials has much deeper reasons than the simple ignorance of what cross-border human mobility means, as evidenced by a recent message by the ostensible authority in charge of justice in the country. On April 14, the Attorney General of the de facto government, Tarek William Saab, wrote on his Twitter account: “The #Kharma or the wheel of #Time?… #Venezuelans who publicly looked down on the #Nation; after being abused in the US, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Spain, etc., they return to #Venezuela thanks to the #VueltaALaPatria (Back to the Homeland) plan designed by President @NiicolasMaduro. ” Carmen Díaz failed to understand that for Venezuelan officials she is a traitor for leaving the country. Who was affected by your decision? To the international image of the Bolivarian revolution.

More than the 2014 and 2017 protests or the claims of human rights organizations, it was the image of the migrants that problematized the automatic public support that some sectors of international progressivism showed for the 21st Century Socialism centered in Caracas. The arrival to different Latin American cities of thousands of migrants from the most vulnerable areas of Venezuela fleeing the Bolivarian paradise and heading to the emptiness in the most precarious conditions cracks the idyllic image that chavismo costly spread through the planet. From that moment the ears of the region began to take an interest in complaints about abuses against human dignity.

During all that time the official response was the denial that there was a migratory wave from Venezuela. Figures on migrants within the country were made-up and a fake request for international funding to assist them was fabricated. In October 2017, precisely at the moment when more impoverished Venezuelans were crossing the border, the de facto government’s Ombudsman, Alfredo Ruiz, assured: “It is not true that Venezuela is a country of emigrants. Venezuela is still a migration host country (…), the flow of people who enter is greater than the people who leave. ” The former director of the Support Network for Justice and Peace tried to suggest that the few who left were from privileged classes, trivializing their reasons for leaving: “If I have problems getting a job, feeling safe, going to some places, or partying, I lose hope.”

The host countries of the region have not taken all necessary and desirable protection measures to guarantee the human rights of Venezuelan migrants. While several of them condemn the Venezuelan dictatorship, in practice they began to restrict the migratory flow of those who were precisely fleeing from it. In an article published by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Dany Bahar and Meagan Dooley diagnose that the magnitude of the crisis has not had the financial response that recipient countries need to tackle it: “In response to the Syrian crisis, for example, the international community mobilized large sums of capital: $ 7.4 billion in refugee response efforts in the first 4 years. Funding for the Venezuelan crisis has not kept pace: 4 years into the crisis, the international community has donated only $ 580 million. In per capita terms, this translates to $ 1,500 per Syrian refugee and $ 125 per Venezuelan refugee. ” Finally, the situation of Venezuelan migrants has not been a priority in the narrative of the directive of the National Assembly, which leads the efforts for the transition to democracy, since doing so would strain relations with the countries that recognize the in-charge presidency of Juan Guaidó. Although aid associations for Venezuelans living abroad have multiplied and they are increasingly beneficiaries of humanitarian action by NGOs, people leaving Venezuela continue in solitude, tempting their fate.

In a document entitled “Essential guidelines for incorporating the human rights perspective in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic,” the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights states: “Border closure measures must be implemented in a non-discriminatory manner, following international law and prioritizing the protection of the most vulnerable. Policies and their implementation, including the forced return and detention of immigrants, must be carried out following human rights obligations and need to be adjusted to ensure that they are compatible with effective public health strategies and maintain adequate conditions. ”. For its part, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in its resolution “Pandemic and Human Rights in the Americas” established as part of the measures aimed at the migrant population, to “Refrain from implementing measures that may hinder, intimidate and discourage access by people in a situation of human mobility to the programs, services, and policies of response and attention amid the pandemic of COVID-19, such as actions of migratory control or repression in the vicinity of hospitals or shelters ”.

Venezuelan authorities have insisted in their message that the spread of the Covid-19 is under “control”, while the opinions of medical specialists, expressed privately due to the risks of arrest for contradicting the official version, indicate that we might be entering the community transmission phase, so it could be expected to go from linear to exponential growth in the coming days. If this were to happen, will Nicolás Maduro blame the “stateless” and “traitor” returnees for the increase in cases in the country? Will he come up with a dark plot of conspiracy from people entering the country to spread the virus? That would be a terrible stigma for those forced to leave the country and, due to the circumstances, now forced to return.