{"id":6454,"date":"2018-02-12T20:00:53","date_gmt":"2018-02-13T01:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=6454"},"modified":"2018-02-18T20:07:32","modified_gmt":"2018-02-19T01:07:32","slug":"venezuelan-refugees-inflame-brazils-already-simmering-migrant-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=6454","title":{"rendered":"Venezuelan Refugees Inflame Brazil\u2019s Already Simmering Migrant Crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Though refugee and migration crises have dominated headlines in recent years, most news stories exclude Brazil. That\u2019s because of the world\u2019s roughly 62.5 million forced migrants<\/a>, according to the United Nations \u2013 just a small proportion are thought to be in Brazil.<\/p>\n

New research suggests this omission needs correcting.<\/p>\n

According to the Forced Migration Observatory, a new database from the Brazilian think tank Instituto Igarap\u00e9, which I co-founded, hundreds of thousands of Brazilians are driven from their homes each year by disasters, development and violent crime.<\/p>\n

Venezuelans escaping economic crisis at home are also now pouring into Brazil. Though neighboring Colombia has born the brunt of this exodus \u2013 with as many as 1 million migrants<\/a> settling there since 2015 \u2013 Brazil has seen 60,000 crossings from Venezuela<\/a> and numbers are rising fast<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A neglected crisis<\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite this influx, Brazil\u2019s main migrant problem remains the millions of displaced people<\/a> already inside its borders. This domestic crisis has mostly simmered under the radar for nearly two decades.<\/p>\n

In part, that\u2019s because internally displaced people are a politically inconvenient topic in Brazil. Each year, hundreds of thousands of Brazilians driven from their land each year by natural disaster<\/a>, infrastructure development<\/a> and violence<\/a> \u2013 the three main causes of forced migration in Brazil. But because they are overwhelmingly poor and marginalized, politicians see few upsides to highlighting their plight.<\/p>\n

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Upwards of 8.8 million people have been displaced across Brazil since 2000. Stefan Ertmann and Jo\u00e3o Felipe\/Wikimedia, CC BY<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/figure>\n

Officials may also be unaware that they exist. In Brazil, migration scholars tend to focus on voluntary population movement<\/a>: which prosperous Brazilian states are attracting new residents, and which are losing them.<\/p>\n

To date, there has been no attempt to compile and analyze comprehensive nationwide data about Brazilian citizens who move \u2013 or are moved \u2013 against their will.<\/p>\n

My team at the Forced Migration Observatory, which launches in mid-February 2018, began this mammoth task in 2016. Pulling information from Brazil\u2019s national development bank, government agencies and non-governmental organizations, we found that a stunning 8.8 million Brazilians \u2013 out of a population of 208 million \u2013 have been forced to flee their homes since 2000.<\/p>\n