By Jon Martin Cullell |
Sao Paulo (BLAZETRENDS).- Dozens of Afghan migrants have been struggling for months in a makeshift camp inside the Sao Paulo international airport, the busiest in Latin America, waiting for the authorities to offer them a decent place to rest.
The recent outbreak of a scabies outbreak among the 206 Afghans camped there has raised fears of a public health crisis, as authorities say they are going to find them room in nearby hotels.
Navid Haidari, a 39-year-old father of a family who had worked as a translator for NATO before the return of the Taliban to power, escaped with his family to Iran on a 38-hour walk and in Tehran he appeared before the Brazilian Embassy .
Since September 2021, the Brazilian government has offered a humanitarian visa to those fleeing the Taliban regime to allow them to travel to the South American country and, once there, apply for refugee status or a residence permit.
Although those interested have to pay for plane tickets themselves, the open door of Brazilian diplomacy has made the country an attractive destination.
The number of Afghan asylum seekers has grown from 30 in 2021 to 405 in 2022 and, from January to May of this year alone, another 311 nationals of that country entered Brazil, according to official data.
However, upon landing in Sao Paulo, many refugees have discovered that the reception centers are full and that the Federal Police send them to a damp hallway on the second floor to be cared for, not by public authorities, but by groups of volunteers. .
Thus, since September of last year, the new arrivals have lived, during the weeks or months it takes to find shelter, in tents covered with donated blankets and separated by suitcase carts from the airport itself.
When Haidari, his wife and their four children, including a one-year-old boy, arrived in Brazil 10 days ago, they did not expect to find a camp.
“I thought there were going to be reception centers and I was surprised to see this,” this Brazilian soccer fan told BLAZETRENDS since he was a child. “We don’t have a place to wash dishes or clothes, and it’s hard to sleep with the noise from the air conditioners, but it’s better than being in the street with the kids,” he adds.
Guarulhos, the municipality where the airport is located, has only 177 beds in shelters for migrants and refugees and all of them are occupied, according to the Mayor’s Office.
The Brazilian Minister of Justice, Flávio Dino, assured this Thursday that the refugees will be able to move to hotels in the region “until a definitive policy is structured to address this serious problem”, but did not specify when the operation will begin.
scabies outbreak
The sense of emergency has grown in recent days, after a doctor sent by the Mayor’s Office discovered last Thursday that a family in the camp had scabies, a highly infectious disease that causes itching.
Beyond the immediate response, the Afghan Front Collective, a group of volunteers that has carried the burden of receiving refugees, demands that the authorities once and for all assume their responsibilities so that this does not happen again.
For Miguel Freire Couy, coordinator of the group, the outbreak was an “announced tragedy” given the lack of basic access to hygiene, essential to combat the infection.
“We have spent almost a year warning of the unworthy conditions, but the competent bodies pass the hot potato from one to the other,” says the volunteer.
Navid Haidari, who wants to add Portuguese to his translator curriculum, hopes that they will soon be transferred to a shelter, but he relativizes the fear of a new outbreak of scabies: “We are a little scared, but at least here they are no longer looking for us.” Taliban”.
