“Freedom and prosperity are two of the crucial elements to success,” said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols.
“And if you don’t have political freedom, if you don’t have economic freedom, if you don’t feel that you and your family can prosper, that’s going to lead to things like irregular migration, crime, gang activity, lack of faith in democratic institutions. Those are all things we want to avoid.”
The countries that suffer from serious democratic challenges, criminal activity, or lack of economic opportunity, are generating the largest number of migrants, said Assistant Secretary Nichols:
“The leading generator of irregular migrants in our region is Venezuela. And there are probably 8 million Venezuelan migrants around our hemisphere, many of them in the front-line states, like Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, but also as far away as Argentina and Chile, or as far north as the United States and Canada. So that obviously is a reflection of the lack of hope or lack of opportunity and a lack of democratic space that the populace has there.”
Nicaragua and Haiti, well as Mexico and northern Central America, are also producing significant numbers of migrants.
Assistant Secretary Nichols noted that the 2022 Los Angeles Declaration on Migration Protection, a document that brought together 20 countries from the region to promote safe, legal migration and to stop irregular migration, has made significant progress:
“It brings together new pathways for people to migrate legally, but also provides training for border officials so that they can control migration. Information sharing among countries so they can help dismantle the networks of migrant smugglers and human traffickers that prey on the needs of those who wish to migrate. It also helps countries work out new facilities to stabilize migrant populations where they are ... The United States, as well as many other countries in the region actually need labor in certain sectors. So facilitating migrants to work in certain areas legally is something that can be quite positive.”
“Promotion of democratic freedoms and economic prosperity are central to our efforts,” said Assistant Secretary Nichols, noting that these are the same goals enshrined in the founding documents of the Western Hemisphere, including the Charter of the Organization of American States and the Inter-American Democratic Charter.
