Ecuador requires US$237 million to attend to 430,000 Venezuelan migrants

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Ecuador requires some US$237 million to attend to the more than 430,000 Venezuelan migrants in the country, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs informed on Tuesday after a preparatory meeting for the donors’ roundtable to be held on June 17 in Canada.

The announcement was made after a virtual meeting of the Working Group for Refugees and Migrants (GTRM) on the needs and economic projections of the countries hosting Venezuelans in preparation for the next International Donors’ Conference.

According to a statement from the Foreign Ministry in Quito, Ecuador’s commitment to care for Venezuelan citizens faces growing economic and social pressures aggravated by the covid-19 pandemic.

Therefore, in order to complement the efforts of the Ecuadorian government, the members of the GTRM projected a figure of US$237 million through the Regional Response Plan for Refugees and Migrants to address the needs of these groups in the country.

The group’s meeting was attended by Ecuadorian diplomatic authorities, as well as the resident coordinator of the United Nations System in Ecuador, Lena Savelli; the ambassador of the United States, Michael Fitzpatrick; the ambassador of the European Union, Charles-Michel Geurts; the representative of UNHCR, Giovanni Bassu; and the head of the mission of the International Organization for Migration, José Iván Dávalos; among others.

During the meeting, the needs and challenges to provide attention to Venezuelan migrants were analyzed to orient the resources obtained in the donor conclave.

The Ecuadorian Foreign Minister, Mauricio Montalvo, said that his country values this initiative, as it is a valuable opportunity to show donors some examples of the work carried out by the Government and international cooperation “in favor of Venezuelan migrant populations that have arrived in the country”.

Ecuador believes that migrants and refugees can contribute to host countries’ development by taking advantage of their experience and knowledge transfer, Montalvo remarked.

He also recalled that the Ecuadorian president, Guillermo Lasso, “ratified the will to undertake a new extraordinary regularization process, which will facilitate access to visas to many Venezuelan citizens”.

The Ecuadorian Vice Minister of Human Mobility, Carlos Alberto Velástegui, stated that, in his opinion, the magnitude of the migratory crisis “would continue as long as Venezuela’s internal conditions do not change”.

Therefore, Velastegui asked to “project the solidarity effort to face a crisis aggravated by the sanitary situation” due to the coronavirus pandemic in the world.