Legitimate Government requires Trinidad and Tobago to investigate the expulsion of 24 Venezuelans, including 16 minors

The presidential commissioner for Foreign Relations, Julio Borges, announced on Tuesday that the Legitimate Government of Venezuela will demand an investigation into the expulsion in precarious conditions from the island of Venezuelan migrants.

“We sent a formal communication to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Trinidad and Tobago, Amery Brown, about the expulsion of 24 Venezuelans of whom 16 are minors, who came to the country fleeing Maduro’s dictatorship,” reported the senior government official in charge through his Twitter account.

Borges, announced that in the statement issued to the Government of Trinidad and Tobago, “we demand an investigation and we urge that international protection be guaranteed.”

Full statement:

On behalf of the interim government of Venezuela and in my capacity as Presidential Commissioner for Foreign Relations, I am writing to you to express our deep concern and rejection of the resolution taken by your country consisting of the expulsion of 24 Venezuelans, 16 of whom are minors including a 4-month-old baby, who had arrived in Trinidad in a boat fleeing from the Venezuelan dictatorship in search of better living conditions.

According to the information that we have collected, the group of people was expelled by your authorities and at the time of writing this the whereabouts of these 8 adults and 16 minors are still unknown. This decision violates the universally recognized principle of non refoulement. In addition, this violates the UNHCR Guidelines for the determination of the best interests of the child and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, the 1969 American Convention on Human Rights and the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 protocol, instruments that have been ratified by your country.

As has been recognized by regional human rights protection bodies, Venezuela is experiencing a complex humanitarian emergency as a result of the shortage of food and medicine, among other calamities, which has also led to the exponential growth of people who have been forced to migrate to other countries in the region as the only way of survival that allows them and their families to preserve their fundamental rights such as life, personal integrity, freedom, health and food, among others.

This serious crisis has particularly impacted groups set in a context of exclusion and historical discrimination, such as boys, girls and adolescents (NNA), women, the elderly, indigenous peoples and Afro-descendants, people with disabilities, people with diseases and people living in poverty. The drama that the Venezuelan people are experiencing is due to the installation in Venezuela of a regime that does not recognize human dignity and that is determined to maintain power at the cost of the suffering of millions of people.

On behalf of the interim government of Venezuela, we respectfully demand the initiation of an investigation of these events by the competent authorities of your country and also the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. We urge you to guarantee international protection in accordance with the practice recognized by the States and the international Treaties in force and binding for Trinidad and Tobago, to the people who arrive in its territory whose human rights are violated by the e3nduring dictatorship in Venezuela.

I take this opportunity to convey a respectful greeting,