The Venezuela crisis is getting worse as more nations tighten their border controls.

Brazilian police look on as a Venezuela migrant camp burns. BBC/EPA.

The Venezuela crisis is getting worse as more nations are tightening their border controls to deal with the stream of refugees. BBC. Ecuador has issued new rules saying that people need a passport to cross into their country on their way to Peru or Chile. The migrants have been traveling through Columbia but are now being turned away at the border with Ecuador if they don't have a passport. Passports are hard to come by in Venezuela due to government dysfunction. 4000 people a day have been arriving at the border with Ecuador. Columbia is outraged by the move as it means many Venezuelans are now stranded in Columbia. 

In Brazil several migrant camps were attacked by outraged Brazilians. The attack follows a robbery that was allegedly committed by a Venezuelan migrant. Soldiers have been deployed to the area while many Venezuelans returned home but set fires to cars before they left. 

My Comment:

It is surprising that it has taken so long for the other governments to react to this crisis. Thousands of Venezuelans have already fled and are now becoming a major burden on local governments who are already dysfunctional. Given the circumstances I would have thought that they would have done this already. 

I am not at all surprised that there is retaliation against these migrants. As much as people hate to admit it when your country is invaded by a horde of desperate and hungry people, some of them already criminals, they are going to commit crimes. And when that happens people aren't going to put up with that. The attack on the Brazilian camps were entirely predictable. 

I do wonder where many of these refugees will end up. A lot of them are stuck in Columbia but I doubt that is a long term solution. And many of the sounding countries are in bad shape themselves. The economic situation in Central America, for example, is better but there is so much violence due to the drug trade that the refugees could hardly stay there. 

The obvious choice are the richer southern countries in South America, like Brazil, Chile and Argentina. None of them are likely to want these refugees either and their richness and strong economies might not last if they have to care for a horde of Venezuelans. 

Europe and North America would be possible destinations as well but there is zero political will in America to take in more refugees from ANY source. And Europe has already been overrun by economic and military refugees from Africa and the Middle East. They don't have room for the people they have now, let alone more refugees from Venezuela. Only Canada seems dumb enough to take in a large number of people but I haven't even heard anything from them doing so. 

Of course there is always the option that we failed to use for the Syrian and Iraqi refugees which is to house the refugees in local countries like Columbia. Doing so would save millions of dollars and would spare the refugees a huge journey so I doubt it will happen. I have no faith in the world's governments to do the smart thing so it's really more of a question as to who gets screwed over the most. 

None of this would be happening though if Venezuela hadn't elected a socialist government who decided that instead of investing into their oil industry they would let it rot and give that money to their poorest residents instead. Doing so ruined the entire country to the point where people are starving to death. Indeed, that is a strong argument for nobody taking in Venezuelans after they willingly elected such an incompetent government for fear that they will do so again in their new countries. 

And things might get worse before they get better. I have been saying for awhile that one of the only advantages Venezuela has is their large military. They might think that a war is the best way out of their economic crisis by raiding territory that is disputed between them and Guyana, which has very little military power. Such an act would be pure desperation but what other choice does Venezuela have? Nobody will help them due to the situation being entirely their fault and their only answer to the socialist polices that ruined their country is to enforce more socialism. There is a real chance of war and an even wore refugee crisis.