A bill establishes a direct link between crime and the massive presence of immigrants who have arrived from Venezuela since 2017.
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By attacking the modification of the decree-law on immigration and a revision of the penal code, the government of the Peruvian president, Pedro Castillo, intends to strike hard against “civic insecurity”, which he attributes largely to “foreign citizens”. He hopes to honor one of his 2021 campaign promises, when he reserved “sixty-two o’clock” to leave Peru to “those who come from other countries to respect respect”.
The text, extremely severity with foreigners, widens the causes of expulsion and lengthens from fifteen to twenty-five years the prohibition of entry into the territory for migrants who commit crimes. Among the new reasons for expulsion: do not respect health measures – not have your vaccines up to date, for example, while vaccination is not compulsory in Peru -, not being able to present your papers of Identity, drive a delivery vehicle without authorization, or even carry a weapon. Heavy sentences are also provided for “disobedience” to authority with a minimum of three years’ imprisonment; or for the refusal to submit to a blood analysis having to determine the ingestion of drugs or alcohol.
Presented on August 15, the bill is not hidden to target above all the Venezuelan migrants, about 1.5 million in the country, far ahead of Colombians (41,000) and Bolivians (21 000) and half of which would be in an irregular situation, according to the administration responsible for immigration.
text “xenophobic”
In a presentation of about fifteen pages, the government intends to link rampant insecurity to the presence of Venezuelans, more massive since 2017. The executive thus wishes to fight crime in the country, the main concern of the Peruvians according to a Recent study by Ipsos, just behind the problem of corruption.
This analysis is however denied by all recent reports published on insecurity. In June, a study by the International Organization for Migration and the Public Ministry indicates that “complaints against refugees and Venezuelan migrants represent a minimal percentage of police registers”, with only 0.6 % of complaints for crimes between 2019 and 2020, in Lima, the capital. For its part, a report by the Ministry of Justice dating from May, on “migration and crime in Peru”, concludes that “it would be irresponsible to establish a causal relationship between the increase in crime and the migratory phenomenon Venezuelan “.
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