Brazil announces deal with US to exchange information on deportees
Brazil's Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Wednesday (Jan. 29) the creation of a working group with the US Embassy in Brasília to exchange information on deported Brazilians and the operation of deportation flights. According to the ministry, the measure aims to guarantee “the safety and dignified and respectful treatment of passengers.”
The plan is to immediately establish a direct line of communication between the members of the group and allow for real-time monitoring of upcoming flights.
The proposal to create a working group had been discussed at a meeting between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and his ministers at the Planalto presidential palace on Wednesday, when the Brazilian government announced that it would set up a humanitarian reception post at Confins International Airport, in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais state, to receive Brazilians deported from the USA. The location was chosen because it is the terminal to which flights chartered by the US government have been destined over the last few years.
Brazil's mobilization comes days after a deportation flight carrying 88 Brazilians suffered a series of problems, with passengers being handcuffed the entire time, reports of aggression on the part of US agents, deprivation of food and access to toilets, as well as technical problems that impaired the functioning of the air conditioning and forced the aircraft to make unscheduled stopovers.
On Monday (27), the Secretary for Brazilian Communities Abroad and Consular and Legal Affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Márcia Loureiro, met with the chargé d'affaires of the US Embassy in Brazil, Gabriel Escobar, to discuss the deportation of Brazilians. Summoning the American authority in this case is a diplomatic gesture that expresses one country's discontent with another.
