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A Nation in Recovery: 10 Facts about Ecuadorian Refugees

Ecuadorian RefugeesIn April, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake killed over 650 people across the provinces of Esmeraldas and Manabí in northwestern Ecuador. It was one of the most powerful earthquakes the nation had ever experienced. Rubbing salt into the wound, two strong aftershocks in May injured 90 people and devastated the two provinces.

The United Nations Refugee Agency has called on donors to immediately provide $73 million of support in order to respond to the needs of 350,000 people affected by the earthquake. Only 15% of that amount, however, has been received.

10 Facts About Ecuadorian Refugees

  1. According to official records, around 73,000 people have been uprooted and are either residing in organized camps and shelters or with host families. Over 30,000 are currently staying in collective centers, where violence and abuse against women, boys and girls are rampant. Moreover, close to 15,000 people have lost their identity papers, making it difficult for them to access basic social programs and services.
  2. The earthquake also destroyed 10,00 buildings and close to 560 schools. Thousands of people are staying in makeshift shelters, and 120,000 children are in immediate need of temporary educational centers. So far, the Ministry of Education has opened up temporary learning centers for 20,000 children and circulated 750 “school in a box” supplies to nearly 60,000 children.
  3. The number of Zika Virus cases increased twelvefold in three months after the earthquake, from 92 to 1,106 nationwide. The most affected demographic is women between the ages of 15 and 49. This age range accounts for 509 cases in the Manabí Province alone.
  4. In 2015, the United Nations Refugee Agency, alongside its partner organization Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society and state and private institutions, launched an inventive poverty reduction program called the Graduation Model, which aims to lift 7,500 people out of poverty in 2016 via financial education and vocational training.
  5. Ecuador hosts the highest number of refugees in all of Latin America. It is home to around 200,000 Colombian migrants, far more than any other Latin American country. Almost all of the Ecuadorian refugees fled to Ecuador from the Colombian civil war. Although Ecuador gets some support from the United Nations and Colombia, it bears most of the social and financial burden for the refugees itself, costing the government around $60 million per year.
  6. Approximately 17,000 refugees, mostly from Colombia, were residing in the areas most affected by the earthquake and its subsequent aftershocks. The crisis has made assimilation more difficult for them.
  7. Since 2010, the asylums and protection spaces for Colombian refugees in Ecuador have been rapidly deteriorating. Ecuador signed both the 1951 Refugee Convention and the 1984 Cartagena Declaration, but the country revised its Refugee Act in the early 2010s to alter the original definition of “refugee.” This has restricted domestic asylum procedures for Colombian refugees, and many have been forced to live in remote jungles by the Colombian border, making them susceptible to armed conflict between FARC rebels trying to cross into Ecuador.
  8. Limited livelihood opportunities, lack of access to health services, discrimination and police harassment are common in some areas. This has made secondary displacement of Colombian refugees within Ecuador common.
  9. Plan Colombia, a U.S.-sponsored initiative working to wipe out cocaine crops in Colombia, ends up destroying adjacent farmlands. This creates a large number of economic migrants who are forced to relocate to Ecuador, where they live in constant threat of belligerents that follow them from Colombia. To be resettled, Colombian refugees must create a new testimony, just to make themselves fit the “refugee” definition.
  10. A survey conducted by the Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health in 2014 reported that 92.2% (404 out of 438) of Colombian refugees in Ecuador did not intend to return to Colombia. Out of these, around nine percent were considering migrating to another area of Ecuador. Some 12% intended to migrate to a third country, mostly to the United States. Moreover, virtually no one had a precise short-term plan.

The April 2016 earthquake hit northwestern Ecuador, where most of the country’s Colombian refugees reside, the hardest. These refugees had originally fled from civil war in Colombia and had already lost their homes once. In Ecuador, they had managed to rebuild their lives. Dealing with the massive refugee influx from Colombia, as well as internally displaced people in Ecuador, remains a daunting task for the Ecuadorian government and the refugee agencies working on the ground.

– Swapnil Mishra
Photo: Flickr

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10 Facts Regarding Colombian Refugees

Colombian Refugees

For over 50 years, guerilla soldiers, paramilitaries, drug cartels and the government’s armed forces have been fighting in Colombia creating waves of refugees. Though each group has different motivations, most are fighting to gain power and influence.

This internal fighting in Colombia has led to the displacement of many individuals across the country. Here are 10 facts about Colombian refugees.

  1. Colombia has the second-highest number of internally displaced persons in the world. Colombia has a staggering population of over 6 million internally displaced persons. The Syrian Arab Republic is the only other country with a higher population with 7.6 million internally displaced persons.
  2. Children are at high risk for displacement and militant group recruitment. Unfortunately, the same laws that let Colombian refugees leave the country’s borders allow militant groups to do the same. Several of these groups are able to follow refugees out of the country and often take children as recruits for their cause.
  3. Indigenous populations and Afro-Colombians are also at-risk. Though they only make up a small proportion of the total Colombian population (3.4 percent), an estimated eight percent of Colombia’s internally displaced persons are of the indigenous population. Afro-Colombians and indigenous Colombians tend to live in the rural areas of Colombia where there is little assistance.
  4. About 250,000 Colombian refugees live in Ecuador. Though many Colombians traveled to Ecuador, only 15,000 have been recognized as refugees by the country. This means only 15,000 Colombians receive government assistance and legal residence permits. Colombian refugees are often discriminated against and struggle to compete for jobs in Ecuador.
  5. Colombian refugees often travel to Panama and Venezuela seeking asylum. In Panama, Colombian refugees are often forced to live in the jungle without basic provisions that would usually accompany refugees in such living environments, according to Refugee Counsel USA. In Venezuela, Colombian refugees tend to have trouble accessing the job market due to a poor refugee status determination system. They also have very limited access to schools and health systems.
  6. Refugee women tend to have trouble finding jobs once displaced. Due to an inability to access the job market, many Colombian refugee women are forced to work on the streets and in brothels. For many, this is the only way they can get money to support their children.
  7. Some refugees are receiving legal support. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the Norweigan Refugee Council (NRC) have provided legal clinics that have helped 14,300 internally displaced persons.
  8. Long-term solutions are being established. The UNHCR has changed its focus from providing immediate service to creating long-term solutions for Colombian refugees. By doing so, the organization hopes to create lasting change for those who need it most.
  9. Their communities are being recognized. Recently, a long-standing refugee community was finally recognized by the city of Cúcuta, Colombia. In its recognition, the community gained access to many of the cities services.
  10. Action is being taken by some. The UNHCR recently established the Gender-Based Violence Information Management System (GBVIMS). In doing so, the organization is helping fight sexual and gender-based violence toward refugees in the countries it operates, including Columbia.

Though many of these facts about Colombian refugees may be discouraging, the refugees have not been forgotten. Organizations are working to help them in their length endeavor, unfortunately, when a crisis is so large, it takes a lot of time and resources in order to effect change.

– Weston Northrop

Photo: Flickr