Subcommittee on International Human Rights Committee on Dec. 3rd, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

I call the meeting to order.

Welcome, everybody. Welcome, Mr. Simms; thank you for joining us today.

I'm sure most of you have heard the sad news that Anita Vandenbeld's dad passed away. She's going through a difficult time.

Welcome to meeting number six of the Subcommittee on International Human Rights. Pursuant to the order of reference of October 27, 2020, the subcommittee will begin the study of the impacts of COVID-19 on displaced persons, particularly in Venezuela and Myanmar.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would encourage all participants to mute their microphones when they're not speaking and to address all comments through the chair. When you have 30 seconds left in your questioning time, I will signal you so that you are aware of the time.

Interpretation is available for everyone through the globe icon at the bottom of your screen, so you'll be able to go there and either not change it if you're bilingual or click on “French” or “English”, depending on what you require.

I would like to welcome our witnesses for our first panel. From Amnesty International, we have Carolina Jimenez, research director for the Americas. From the Canadian Venezuelan Engagement Foundation, we have Gabi J. Garcia, president.

Ms. Jimenez and Ms. Garcia, you will both have five minutes, and then we will go to the members for questions.

[Dr. Carolina Jimenez, Research Director for the Americas, Amnesty International]

Thank you very much to the committee for inviting Amnesty International to discuss Venezuela's human rights crisis and its impact on forced displacement.

As we speak, the human rights crisis in Venezuela persists and continues to deteriorate, as is evidenced by the ever-increasing number of Venezuelans seeking protection in other countries. As of the 5th of November, this number bordered 5.5 million people.

Venezuelans are fleeing in the context of massive human rights violations. However, only 2.5 million have regular migratory status in their host countries, and a much smaller number, 143,000, have been formally recognized as refugees.

Regrettably, some countries in the Americas have failed to comply with international refugee rights established. Countries like Peru, for example, have resorted to increasingly restrictive practices at their borders, while Trinidad and Tobago regularly deports Venezuelans, including children.

In some of the main host countries in Latin America, like Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, 90% of Venezuelan migrants and refugees work in the informal sector without any access to social security for themselves and their families. Given this context, it was not surprising that at the beginning of the pandemic we witnessed tens of thousands of Venezuelans return to their home country, many on foot, because they had lost their jobs, and some were also left homeless. From mid-March to October, it is estimated that over 135,000 people have returned to Venezuela.

But what have they returned to? Unfortunately, many have been forced to stay in state-run quarantine centres. Amnesty International believes that in times of public health emergencies like this one, authorities may legitimately impose quarantines. However, our research has found that in Venezuela many of the warehouses, sports stadiums and other facilities where the government has placed people to complete mandatory state-run quarantines have often been unsanitary or lack basic supplies that could amount to a treatment.

It is now reported that the number of people returning has decreased in the last two months or so, and perhaps surprisingly, given the context, local NGOs are reporting informal crossings along the border with Colombia, meaning that Venezuelans are once again leaving the country.

The humanitarian crisis will continue to worsen. With widespread shortages of essential goods and services—food, health care, water—and high levels of extreme poverty, people will continue to flee their communities. For many, it is the only option to survive.

All of this happens in a context of severe repression, social control and systemic impunity. The United Nations fact-finding mission on Venezuela published a landmark report in September and established that there were reasonable grounds to believe that crimes against humanity have been committed in Venezuela since 2014.

Before I conclude, I would like to once again reaffirm the importance of supporting the rights of millions of refugees in the Americas. In the Central America, Mexico and U.S. migration corridor, for example, we have seen entire families, as well as unaccompanied migrant children from Guatemala, Honduras and Salvador, make the dangerous journey to seek protection, only to be detained and deported to the same dangerous communities they tried to flee.

Refugees from Venezuela and from Central America urgently need the support of the international community to ensure that their rights are guaranteed and respected. Human rights crises require humanitarian solutions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Ms. Jimenez.

Now we will go to Ms. Garcia for five minutes.

[Gabi Garcia, President, Canadian Venezuelan Engagement Foundation]

I want to thank you, Carolina, because I think you included all the problems and the numbers of Venezuela.

I want to highlight the humanitarian crisis that we are living in, in Venezuela, and with the Venezuelan migrants in Latin America.

In Venezuela the overall poverty rate is 96% of the population. It is a high number because we have a lack of food, medicine, water, natural gas and diesel. The levels of malnutrition and lack of education among Venezuelan children have highly increased since last year.

The crisis is highlighted in the vulnerability of migrants. We have three kinds of crises. There is a health crisis because the Venezuelan migrants are exposed to the virus and do not have food to protect themselves. The Venezuelans find it difficult to access health services in the country they have moved to as a result of legal, cultural or other barriers that they find in the surrounding countries.

When they decided to return, as Carolina said, only 123,000 returned from Colombia in buses and on foot. When they came back to Venezuela because they needed to be reunited with their families, they found that almost 90% of the hospitals had a critical shortage of supplies and that more than half of Venezuela's doctors had left the country. There aren't even enough beds for the 32 million in Venezuela.

On the other hand, the socio-economic crisis affects Venezuelan migrants because they subsist on almost nothing. They work in the informal economy and only a few of them have access to social protection in any of the countries. Non-essential workers are forced to stay home and society is operating in a reduced capacity. Venezuelans find themselves in a more vulnerable situation.

The third crisis is a protection crisis. Venezuelan women and girls—and this is a point that I want to highlight—are especially vulnerable right now. The rates of domestic violence against women have been on the rise during confinement in Latin America. Venezuelan women and girls, evicted from their homes, are at risk of sexual exploitation and abuse. The numbers are high, and more of them have to survive on prostitution just to have some food for themselves and their families.

In other cases, the fear of COVID-19 exacerbates already high levels of xenophobia, racist stigmatization and even attacks against refugees and migrants in the country.

The Venezuelan humanitarian crisis and the social and economic costs of the pandemic will require more help for people who are more vulnerable. The international community has the opportunity to ensure the well-being of Venezuelans in the country and those who are displaced.

The Canadian NGOs who work with Venezuela can help the Canadian government to reinforce the aid to help Venezuelans stay in the country, rather than being forced to return to a more difficult situation in other countries.

I want to thank the committee for inviting us.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Ms. Garcia and Ms. Jimenez.

Now we are going to the members for questions. We're going to start with the Liberals, and that will be Mr. Simms, for seven minutes.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Thank you, Chair.

I want to thank our guests for their powerful words and as witnesses for what this horrendous situation is giving to these people. We're deeply concerned.

I want to address the bad actor situation when it comes to the nations surrounding Venezuela. You mentioned Peru earlier, but in the case of Brazil and Colombia, who is doing what they can to measure up to what they feel is a crisis and want to help Venezuelan refugees, and who are not acting in good faith for these Venezuelan refugees, not just for COVID-19 but in general, in what they're doing, especially for the domestic abuse and sexual exploitation that is being talked about?

I'll start with Ms. Jimenez.

[Dr. Carolina Jimenez]

Thank you. That's a very important question, because we need to acknowledge that it is a crisis that can be felt as overwhelming for host countries, and 90% of those 5.5 million people are in Latin American countries. Yes, the numbers are staggering, and yes, the host communities are developing countries as well.

There are a few things I would like to point out. You have countries such as Trinidad and Tobago that refuse to acknowledge that the Venezuelans fleeing the human rights crisis should be considered refugees. Not only that, but the laws in Trinidad and Tobago still criminalize irregular entry, contrary to international standards of human rights.

The deportations that have taken place in the last two years included deportation of women and children as young as six months of age. Three weeks ago, they deported a baby. The refugees have been met with a response from the government that unfortunately defies belief.

The international community—the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the UNHCR, and so on—reacted strongly against these deportations. The Government of Trinidad and Tobago refused to acknowledge that they had made a mistake and clearly stated that the deportations will continue. You have countries such this where the response is very negative, and it has not changed in the last few years.

When it comes to countries such as Colombia, Brazil and Peru, there is a mixed response. Brazil has shown some good practices. They have recognized refugees in this instance in short periods of time, in special operations types of things, and they have moved refugees from cities where they were highly vulnerable to cities where there are better conditions, yet there are still many people without regular status.

In Colombia, where you have more than 1.7 million Venezuelans, the challenge is higher because, as I said earlier, the magnitude of the crisis is bigger. At the beginning of the crisis in 2014-2015, Colombia did try to address the issue of irregular status and created alternative mechanisms. Most Venezuelans do not have refugee status in Latin America, but they created alternative ways to protect people, such as temporary status, and so on. Unfortunately not even 40% of Venezuelans living in Colombia have regular status, so I think the Colombian government could do more to implement measures to regularize people.

As well, I think some key politicians have expressed themselves in ways that promote a xenophobic narrative, and that should be avoided.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Sure it should.

I don't think anyone really used this extensively, but we should use as an international example how we treated Syrian refugees in Canada and we should also point to other countries that don't measure up to what we consider to be a good standard by which people should be treated who come in across our borders and are just desperate for help.

Ms. Garcia, you can address that issue as well, but before my time runs out, I want to talk about the 135,000 people you mentioned who came back in. The question is, what do they come back to? What are the circumstances by which they come back?

You commented on the refugees in the other countries, but also, when they come back into Venezuela, obviously they're going back to their own circumstances, which are not the same as when they left.

[Gabi Garcia]

No. As Carolina said, the circumstances have worsened. The problem is that if you are a refugee or—

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Ms. Garcia, could you hold your mike closer to your mouth? I apologize for interrupting.

[Gabi Garcia]

Okay.

The problem is that when people come back, they find that Venezuela has worsened in the numbers in terms of lack of medicine, food and everything. If you are in a country where you don't have legal status, you don't have enough. You have an informal job or you don't have anything to sustain yourself or your family, but you say you prefer to stay in your country because you have family who can help in some way. Because of the COVID, most of them are without jobs. They are informal workers and they were the ones who left the jobs. They return to Venezuela looking for family support, because when they left, most were young adults and they left their children and their parents.

Venezuela right now is a country full of old people. They don't even have food. They are also dealing with COVID.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Ms. Garcia.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Thank you for your insights.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Mr. Simms.

We'll be moving now to the Conservatives and Mr. Reid. You have seven minutes.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses.

Ms. Garcia, if I could, I'd like to continue by asking you some additional follow-up questions.

First, I want to get a sense of the nature of migration. Clearly, if we take the last number of years as a whole, people have on net been leaving Venezuela—about five million in total. We're heard from previous witnesses that there are people returning to Venezuela, but I got the impression there are also still people trying to leave Venezuela. One of our witnesses last week talked about 100 different points where they're illegally crossing the border into Colombia, and in some cases putting themselves in considerable danger.

Are both flows happening at the same time? What is going on?

[Gabi Garcia]

What is going on is there is no hope for Venezuelans inside Venezuela. A lot of people, young people, don't see any future for themselves or their children, so they try to leave. From 2017, the flow of migrants has increased, and they are leaving by the thousands. They get to different countries and they stay there. The proportion between the 5.5 million migrants and the 100,000 coming back is high.

The ones who are coming are doing so mostly because their families are in Venezuela and they cannot support them. From 2017 to 2018, a lot of money entered Venezuela, because people had their jobs outside and they could send $30, $40, $50 or $10, and it was enough to buy food for your family to survive in Venezuela.

If you don't have work and you don't have money in Colombia, in Peru or in Brazil, your family in Venezuela doesn't have any money for food. They don't have anything to eat. They don't have food, they don't have medicine and they are old people, most of them. They are children and they need somehow.... They lived for one year, for two years with the money that came into Venezuela as remesas. I don't know how to say this in English; it's when you send money.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

It's a remittance. It's called “remittance” in English.

[Gabi Garcia]

Yes, remittances, but that's finished with the COVID because the people don't have jobs. The people in Venezuela do not work because there are no formal jobs, or very few of them. They stay home all day long. The children have no connectivity. They don't have classes and they don't have education, so if you have some level of education, you try to leave the country to give your children a better future.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Okay, thank you.

Dealing with COVID itself, the actual disease as opposed to the reactions that different countries have had to the disease, we know now that it is much more dangerous for older people, people who have underlying conditions frequently associated with age.

I'm left with the impression from what you said that the people who left the country are largely younger people who are then sending money back to Venezuela to help a population that's older. Looking at the impact of the disease itself, as opposed to people's reactions to the disease, is it the case that because of the age profile, the people who have left are not as badly affected as those who have remained behind?

[Gabi Garcia]

Yes. The problem is that we don't have enough testing in Venezuela, so the people are dying. The last resort, as you said, is that they die from COVID, so there are a lot of people dying. We don't have the statistics, the numbers, because we don't have the tests. The government stated some numbers, but you cannot really believe those numbers.

In the countryside there are a lot of small towns, and the older people are dying and cannot even pay to be buried, etc., so it's a very complicated situation. Even in a developed country like Canada, we all know that we have a complicated situation and we have some restrictions and everything. You can imagine a country in which yesterday the president said that for December there is flexibility regarding the measures because it's December and everybody has to celebrate, so for all of December we don't have any restrictions related to COVID.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Is that in Venezuela or one of the other countries?

[Gabi Garcia]

That's in Venezuela. This is inside Venezuela, yes.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

I want to ask one last thing. I apologize that all of my questions are to you, Ms. Garcia, and that none are to Ms. Jimenez, but it's just what your testimony prompted.

With regard to the issue of NGOs helping Venezuelans to stay “in country”—that's the term you used—did you mean that we would help Venezuelans to stay in Venezuela or help them to stay in places like Colombia and not have to return to Venezuela? I wasn't sure which of the two you meant.

[Gabi Garcia]

Canada has been very helpful with respect to immigrants in all of the countries around, but I am always asking for help for the people who stay in Venezuela. We need to work maybe with NGOs, as we have a lot of NGOs working inside Venezuela, to try to keep the children and the people in Venezuela, not to look for solutions for the immigrants and the refugees, etc.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Thank you. That's very helpful.

I think I'm out of time. Thank you very much.