RHON­DOR DOWLAT

Se­nior Re­porter

rhon­dor.dowlat@guardian.co.tt

Tears of grief and con­fu­sion filled the eyes of Venezue­lan refugees and their fam­i­ly mem­bers yes­ter­day, af­ter hear­ing news that their com­pa­tri­ots who were de­tained at the He­li­port in Ch­aguara­mas were to be de­port­ed.

Venezue­lan refugee Eli Ur­baez, who was in­con­solable, told the Guardian Me­dia via phone from in­side the fa­cil­i­ty that she has a 12-year-old daugh­ter she will now be forced to leave be­hind.

“She’s stay­ing with a friend of mine. I don’t know what will hap­pen to my daugh­ter. They’re tak­ing me away from her,” Ur­baez said.

Ur­baez’s boyfriend, Daniel, said he is now very con­cerned and quite sad­dened, as he says they are very hard work­ers. He said they came here to work, while Eli was al­so run­ning from per­se­cu­tion in Venezuela.

Daniel said he doesn’t know what will hap­pen with Ur­baez’s daugh­ter. He said Ur­baez was one of the 143 mi­grants de­tained on Ju­ly 19, fol­low­ing a raid at a bar in St James. She and the oth­ers were at­tend­ing a par­ty when po­lice and Im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers raid­ed the bar.

“Her on­ly sin was to go out on that night. We nev­er go out so we won’t spend nor ex­pose our­selves, but two of her friends asked her to go out with them. Ini­tial­ly, she said no, then she said ok, as her friends con­tin­ued nag­ging her,” Daniel said.

Ur­baez was one of sev­er­al de­tainees who spoke to Guardian Me­dia via video calls to high­light their plight in­side the fa­cil­i­ty.

An­oth­er mi­grant, Reina Acos­ta, said she will leave be­hind her eight-month-old Trinida­di­an-born son with her hus­band Luis Cardiel.

Since Acos­ta’s de­ten­tion, Cardiel has had to leave the child with dif­fer­ent peo­ple in or­der to go and work.

Cardiel said he was now dev­as­tat­ed.

Mi­grant Luisa Vil­laroel added: “I’m one of the many that has been de­tained here in the Ch­aguara­mas He­li­port, I’m one of the mi­grants that are here suf­fer­ing, I re­al­ly don’t know how to say it or how to ex­plain it but we are here suf­fer­ing. I suf­fer with my back, my spine, I have a dam­aged clav­i­cle, I’ve been com­plain­ing about that pain and the on­ly thing they give me is Fla­mar, which is not help­ing at all. I am cur­rent­ly on the bed, well mat­tress where I sleep, look, look at the mat­tress, so you all can see the con­di­tions we are held in, be­hind me are the toi­lets and there is a fil­tra­tion, look at these con­di­tions, look at my hand, it’s wet and this is where I have to sleep.”

Venezue­lan Luis San­valentin, who col­lapsed on Wednes­day, added, “I’m 51 years old and I’m de­tained here in the He­li­port in Ch­aguara­mas. I suf­fer from hy­per­ten­sion, yes­ter­day (Wednes­day) I col­lapsed and they took me to a nurs­ing sta­tion to the back of the build­ing, my blood pres­sure has been very high every day, to the point that I’m feel­ing very un­well.

“When­ev­er I tell them I’m un­well they get up­set with me. Where I was treat­ed, they on­ly gave me first aid, they don’t give me any type of treat­ment. My blood pres­sure has been high for a cou­ple of days and I am ask­ing for help, hy­per­ten­sion tablets. How can you help me? Please help me?”

Speak­ing about the de­vel­op­ment, ac­tivist Sofia Leon said she was up­set by what tran­spired.

“It is ab­solute­ly ap­palling and con­cern­ing that this ad­min­is­tra­tion would have hu­man be­ings de­tained in such ap­palling, un­hy­gien­ic con­di­tions. Fur­ther­more, even hav­ing de­nied some of the de­tainees med­ical as­sis­tance, for ill­ness­es such as asth­ma, high blood pres­sure, a de­tainee even had a mis­car­riage on this ad­min­is­tra­tion’s watch. We, Trinidad and To­ba­go, have a dis­mal record on hu­man rights,” Leon said.

“Where is this ad­min­is­tra­tion’s em­pa­thy, com­pas­sion for their fel­low hu­mans? Are refugees not hu­man? Our own Trinida­di­an cit­i­zens are ap­peal­ing for com­pas­sion, em­pa­thy with re­gards to crime, lack of jobs, food prices and you are not lis­ten­ing. It’s quite sil­ly of me to think that you would lis­ten to plights of com­pas­sion to­wards fel­low hu­man be­ings.”

She added, “Again, the hu­man rights of those de­tained refugees are be­ing tram­pled up­on. This comes as an­oth­er em­bar­rass­ment to Trinidad and To­ba­go. Re­mem­ber the mi­nors that were de­port­ed and that had to re­turn, re­mem­ber the mur­dered in­no­cent 18-month-old by our own Coast Guard? This is an­oth­er stain on our T&T hu­man rights record!”

Leon not­ed that the ad­min­is­tra­tion could see sanc­tions if it con­tin­ued break­ing the oblig­a­tions of the UN Con­ven­tion for Refugees.