More than 200 Venezuelans crossed the border illegally into Ecuador on Tuesday, fleeing a deepening economic and political crisis at home in a desperate race to get to Peru before new entry restrictions kick in on Saturday.
This year 423,000 Venezuelans have entered Ecuador through the Rumichaca border near the southwestern Colombian town of Ipiales. Alarmed, Ecuador last Saturday put in place rules requiring Venezuelans to show passports, rather than just national identity cards. Peru will do the same this Saturday.
Hundreds of migrants who had begun traveling days ago by bus and on foot through Colombia from Venezuela before the policy change crossed the Rumichaca checkpoint on Tuesday. More than a dozen Ecuadorean police watched them, but did nothing to stop them.