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As coronavirus explodes in Venezuela, Maduro's government blames the country's returning refugees
Source: Washington Post
As coronavirus explodes in Venezuela, Maduro’s government blames ‘biological weapon’: the country’s returning refugees
By Ana Vanessa Herrero, Anthony Faiola and Mariana Zuñiga
7/19/2020, 9:53:19 a.m.
CARACAS, Venezuela — The "biological" threat was gathering on the western border, Venezuela's socialist government claimed. So, besieged President Nicolás Maduro, ever vigilant against potential invasion, dispatched gun-toting reinforcements to the frontier.
The 57-year-old authoritarian wasn’t worried about the Colombian army. Rather, he was targeting his own people — Venezuelan migrants abroad, left jobless by the coronavirus pandemic, now returning home.
Many are stealing in from Colombia, entering the country through illegal crossings, without testing for the novel coronavirus. Maduro says they’re fueling a dangerous spike in cases in this uniquely vulnerable nation.
“Those who cross [back home] illegally, you are killing your families,” Maduro said in a televised speech last week. “The Colombian virus has sneaked everywhere, and is killing good people.”
Venezuela’s U.S.-backed opposition says Maduro’s government is making a bad situation worse by penning new arrivals in ill-equipped quarantine centers, where opposition figures say the virus is spreading.
-snip-
By Ana Vanessa Herrero, Anthony Faiola and Mariana Zuñiga
7/19/2020, 9:53:19 a.m.
CARACAS, Venezuela — The "biological" threat was gathering on the western border, Venezuela's socialist government claimed. So, besieged President Nicolás Maduro, ever vigilant against potential invasion, dispatched gun-toting reinforcements to the frontier.
The 57-year-old authoritarian wasn’t worried about the Colombian army. Rather, he was targeting his own people — Venezuelan migrants abroad, left jobless by the coronavirus pandemic, now returning home.
Many are stealing in from Colombia, entering the country through illegal crossings, without testing for the novel coronavirus. Maduro says they’re fueling a dangerous spike in cases in this uniquely vulnerable nation.
“Those who cross [back home] illegally, you are killing your families,” Maduro said in a televised speech last week. “The Colombian virus has sneaked everywhere, and is killing good people.”
Venezuela’s U.S.-backed opposition says Maduro’s government is making a bad situation worse by penning new arrivals in ill-equipped quarantine centers, where opposition figures say the virus is spreading.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/coronavirus-venezuela-migrant-maduro/2020/07/19/582c659c-c518-11ea-a99f-3bbdffb1af38_story.html
