Hundreds of Venezuelan migrants enter Peru despite passport rule

Hundreds of Venezuelan migrants entered Peru on Saturday to seek refugee status or for other humanitarian reasons, Peruvian authorities said, despite a new rule prohibiting Venezuelans without passports from crossing into Peru from Ecuador taking effect.

Peru implemented the passport requirement on Saturday due to a four-fold increase in migrants fleeing economic collapse in Venezuela in the past eight months, in a move authorities said would help them register entrants. Many Venezuelans struggle to obtain passports and arrive only with national identity cards.

"There are hundreds that have entered with a petition for refugee status, a procedure that is allowing people without passports to enter," said Abel Chiroque, the director of the public defender's office in the border town of Tumbes. "We must act humanely with this vulnerable population."