Federal judge Luis Armella authorized last night the provisional entry into the country of the 6 pregnant Russian women who filed writs of habeas corpus following being delayed at the Ezeiza airport due to problems with their documentation, according to judicial sources.
The magistrate held that “What Migrations did was correct insofar as to enter to settle in the country you have to go through the corresponding procedures and not declare entry as a tourist”indicated the informants.
Admission was decided, however, “given the state of advanced pregnancy, and for humanitarian reasonss”, indicated the sources.
Is regarding foreign, migrant and pregnant womenTherefore, denying them access might constitute a case of discrimination, was the criterion adopted by the Prosecutor’s Office, the sources consulted indicated.
This followingnoon, the national director of Migrations, Florencia Carignano, assured that the inadmissibility of the six pregnant Russian citizens to enter the country In principle, he responded to the usual administrative procedure to resolve suspected cases of lying and being a “false tourist.”
In this context, the national official warned that the arrival of these women in the country occurred while a judicial investigation into “criminal” gangs, which is being processed in the federal jurisdiction of Buenos Aires.
That file, as Télam was able to find out, is in the hands of federal judge María Servini and prosecutor Federico Delgado, and is in full process and with ongoing test measures.
In week 33, do tourism without a return ticket and high purchasing power
According to the official, there are six Russian citizens who came alone, “all in the 33rd or 34th week of pregnancy, and all said they came to do tourism.”
“When we see that They don’t have a return ticket, they don’t know how to explain where they are going to go sightseeing, something that is strange for a 34-week pregnant womanwe begin to suspect that they do not come to do tourism, “he said.
The immigration authorities must be governed by “a procedure for the resolution of cases before the well-founded suspicion of false tourist“, as it works” in all countries, “said Carignano in dialogue with the TN channel.
“In this case it was detected that it was false tourism, because they themselves admitted that they come to have their children” in Argentina, added.
In this regard, the official explained that “it is not a crime” to come to have a child in the country, but people “of non-Mercosur nationality” to be able to do so they must “go to the consulate and get a visa and explain the reasons.” AND female Russian citizens inadmitted between yesterday and today did not present such required papers.
The women “are not detained, they are free and in charge of the airlines with which they arrived, which they were offered to return to their country and they did not want to“, said the director of Migrations, and warned regarding the presence of” lawyers who are part of gangs that are being investigated in Comodoro Py “, in federal courts.
Investigate criminal gangs
“There is a judicial investigation that is behind these gangs that bring women and men, and behind there is a million-dollar business“he confirmed.
According to the official, since last August there has been a “an increased flow of Russian citizens” and, particularly, of Russian citizens with advanced pregnancies.
“The amount is really big per day. Last night, on the last Ethiopian (airline) flight, 33 Russian citizens entered with pregnancies between 32 and 33 weeks“, held.
After suspecting that it was a crime of traffickingthe authorities conducted a total of “365 interviews” with Russian citizens, all of them “of high purchasing power”, who arrived in the country alone and said “that they had come through agencies that offered them a whole package.”
“They all come right at week 33, there is a pattern of conduct that is being investigated by Justice and for which Migrations provided information“, assured Carignano and clarified that many” came with tickets or rents “, unlike the women who are stranded in Ezeiza.
To contextualize, the director explained that in the last year 10,500 people of Russian nationality entered the country, among them “5,819 pregnant women”, And of those 10,500, 7,000 “are no longer in the country, and that is the problem.”
«We are delighted that they come to make their life in Argentina, but the problem is that they arrive, have children, write them down as Argentines, they leave a power of attorney to the attorneys, they leave and never come back. There are people here who are using our passport,” he said.
In this regard, the official warned that the problem is that this affects the Argentine passport, which is “very sure” and therefore they can enter 171 countries without a visa or “get the United States visa for 10 years.”
“If we do not control who we give the passports to, the Argentine passport will no longer have the confidence it has in other countries today. We have to take care of our passport and the benefits we have achieved because we have been working to make our passport safe.“, he concluded.
Rise of “birth tourism”, according to a Guardian investigation
Already in the last days of the year 2022, the British newspaper The Guardian published an article entitled «Everyone is looking for options: Russian women fly to Argentina to give birth“, which narrates that since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the country experienced a boom in “birth tourism” from Russia.
In the publication, they quote Georgy Polin, head of the consular department of the Russian Embassy in Argentina, who estimated that between 2,000 and 2,500 Russian women moved to Argentina in 2022many of them with the plan to give birth in the country, and predicted that this year “that number can grow to 10,000.”
In The Guardian they highlighted that Russian women chose Argentina for the advantages of their passport, “which allows you to visit 171 countries without a visa, including (those of) the European Union, the United Kingdom and Japan«, and for the high quality of its medical care, both public and private.
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