The Chilean government has announced the mobilization of the Army on the borders with Peru and Bolivia to control the entry of illegal immigrants into the country.
This was confirmed this Saturday by the Chilean Interior Minister, Carolina Tohá, who detailed that the military deployment will be carried out in the Northern Macrozone, where Chile borders Peru and Bolivia, as reported by ‘La Tribuna’.
The measure was taken after the Executive confirmed an increase in migratory flows in the country, which has caused “the massive arrival of the population through unauthorized crossings”.
“We are going to be touring some of the places of the deployment next (…) seeing how this work of the Armed Forces is going to be organized and supported, which will not act alone, they will act in coordination with other agencies”, specified the head of the Interior, detailing that the operation will last 90 days.
At the same time, she stated that the functions of the soldiers “are very clear” and that they will only be able to carry out identity controls, search luggage and detain people.
Regarding using military firepower, Tohá has clarified that the Army’s job is to support border protection, not to stop it “with bullets”.
“It is not the objective of the Armed Forces to stop the movement along the border by making acts of force with the circulating people”.
Earlier, the mayor of the border town of Colchane, Javier García, estimated that up to 400 people enter the country daily through unauthorized crossings, a figure he described as “derisory”, according to an interview with Radio Universo.
With information from LGI