Chile on Sunday enacted a new migration law that will facilitate the administrative expulsions of immigrants.
“The main objective of this new Migration Law is to bring order to our country through an orderly, safe and regular migration policy, which allows legal migration and combats illegal immigration,” said President Sebastián Piñera during the promulgation.
The new rule replaces an existing one since 1975.
If with the previous law a foreigner could arrive in Chile with the procedure of tourist and then change his situation to worker in the country, this cannot be done with the new regulations.
The new law “allows foreigners who want to come to Chile to do so by telling the truth about their intentions, avoiding deception and abuse,” so they will need to apply for the visa before arriving in the country, Piñera said.
In addition, the regulations “facilitate the administrative expulsions of migrants entering Chile illegally, through clandestine steps, without complying with our laws or validating their criminal records,” the president continued, lamenting that in the at least five people have lost their lives so far this year in illegal crossings along the northern border.
“We do not want organized crime, drug trafficking, smuggling, trafficking and trafficking in people or those who do not respect our laws to enter our country,” he added.
The regulations were processed over a period of eight years and were taken to the Constitutional Court which removed 06:00 articles, including one urging to facilitate the assisted return of children entering the country alone, which was declared unconstitutional.
Chile was denounced this week by Amnesty International which claims that the new project “could reduce the opportunities for migrants to regularize their legal status once they are in Chile and undermine the principle of non-refoulement”, as happened with the 100 migrants expelled in February irregularly, mostly Venezuelans and Colombians, when court rulings were still being processed, he said.
The National Coordinator for Migrants flatly rejected the new law.
“It will cause profound damage not only to those who today are subject to forced migration to the region, but to the entire migrant population already residing in the country,” its president Vanessa González noted.