Brazil sends troops after clashes at Venezuela border

Brazil's President Michel Temer called an emergency meeting of key ministers after ordering troops to the border with Venezuela as regional tensions build over the exodus from its crisis-hit neighbour.

The move comes after residents in the border town of Pacaraima clashed violently with Venezuelan migrants, driving them out of makeshift camps.

Temer held the meeting yesterday at his presidential palace in Brasilia with key ministers, including those of defense, public security and foreign affairs, but no further details were being disclosed.

The situation in Pacaraima, on the opposite side of the border to the Venezuelan town of Santa Elena de Uairen, was calm early yesterday, partly because locals managed to force out Venezuelans living on the streets.

"More than 1,200 Venezuelan migrants returned to Venezuela," after Saturday's violence, a spokesman for a Brazilian migration task force told AFP.

"The city looks deserted today, it's very quiet because police reinforcements have arrived and the markets are reopening," said a local in the town of around 12,000, who did not wish to be identified.

The public security ministry announced it was sending a contingent of 60 troops to join the teams in the area.

Tens of thousands of Venezuelans have crossed the border into Brazil over the past three years as they seek to escape the economic, political and social crisis gripping their country.

The latest tensions began early yesterday, hours after a local merchant was robbed and severely beaten in an incident blamed on Venezuelan suspects, in Pacaraima, where an estimated 1,000 immigrants had been living on the street.

Dozens of locals then attacked the immigrants' two makeshift camps and burned their belongings, forcing the Venezuelans back across the border.

Shots were fired, stores were shuttered and debris littered the streets.

"It was terrible, they burned the tents and everything that was inside," said Carol Marcano, a Venezuelan who works in Boa Vista and was on the border returning from Venezuela.

"There were shots, they burned rubber tires."
Meanwhile, Caracas called on Brazil to provide "corresponding guarantees to Venezuelan nationals and take measures to safeguard and secure their families and belongings."