Mass deportation of illegal immigrants appears to be the solution to the huge crisis gripping the United States. Nevertheless, unless the root causes of immigration are addressed, criminals like Venezuela's Torren de Aragua gang will continue to flow into this country.
Authoritarian regimes in Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua play a key role in creating the migration crisis. What happens in those countries has a direct impact on this crisis. After 2023, the three governments will perfect strategy.
Cuba sent people. Venezuela's dictatorship offered the airline CONVIASA, and Nicaragua promoted free routes through Managua airport. Thus began a mass exodus of thousands of migrants from there to the US southern border. This is not the natural migration of the past, but a man-made crisis.
Venezuela is using immigration as a weapon of blackmail against the US Torren de Argua connected to a gang Venezuelan The dictatorship has successfully infiltrated 16 American states with drugs and crime. It is as much a foreign policy issue as it is a national security issue.
Newly added in July last year, economic crisis It broke out in Cuba. Endless power outages, accelerating currency devaluation, food shortages, and brutal repression provided the perfect fuel for increased immigration.
Immigration is a good source of income for tyrants. This is because increased immigration means increased remittances to authoritarian governments. In 2023, Nicaragua will receive approximately $5 billion in remittances, with even more expected to arrive by the end of this year.
The accelerated strategy implemented by Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua has caused devastating and visible effects in areas as far away as South Texas and New York. and Massachusetts. But in the short term, there will be more remittances to these countries. That's how the dictatorship continues.
Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela have successfully presented the false narrative that sanctions are the gasoline that fuels migration. Nothing could be further from the truth, but the script continues to sell among some intellectuals and politicians.
Oppression, exclusion, and unjust enrichment of the ruling elite managua, Havana and caracas These are the main causes of forced and desperate migration. The seven million Venezuelan exiles are living proof of this human tragedy.
According to the White House, the current situation is Nicaragua and Venezuela “It continues to pose an extraordinary and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”
Last year, the three authoritarian states hosted former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. These authoritarian states also maintain very close cooperation with China and diplomatic relations with North Korea.
While the announced mass deportation policy aims to restore law and order to the US borders, foreign policy toward Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela remains paramount. Immigration cannot be separated from national security or foreign policy.
Concrete and clear attention is urgently needed against these regimes, which are seen as extraordinary and extraordinary threats to national security. Accordingly, a special Permanent Secretary should be created to pay special attention to these regimes and provide detailed oversight. Extraordinary problems require extraordinary responses.
It is critical that we consider economic and commercial strategies that will drive significant change in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Now is not a good time to lift sanctions in exchange for immigration. Agreements of this nature only solve temporary problems.
It is critical that we assess and even end the privileges of authoritarian states that still enjoy the benefits of the international monetary system, the US dollar, tourism, and free trade with the most powerful nations on earth.
The immigration hemorrhage is a symptom of a larger problem. Now is the right time to resolve the issue before Torren de Aragua takes more innocent lives.
Arturo McFields is an exiled journalist, former OAS Ambassador to Nicaragua, and former member of the Norwegian Peace Corps and the National Defense University Security Seminar.
