President Piñera evaluated the immigration regularization process: 264,257 foreigners normalized their situation
The President also inaugurated the new offices of the Department of Foreign Services and Immigration (Departamento de Extranjería y Migración), located in Santiago, which will provide better attention to the immigrants who are regularizing their situation in Chile.
President Sebastián Piñera highlighted this Wednesday that more than 264,000 immigrants have regularized their situation in Chile over the last three months after inaugurating the new offices of the Department of Foreign Services and Immigration in Santiago.
“We are really pleased because this new Immigration Policy has received overwhelming support from Chileans as well as from people who have come to start a new life in our country,” the President said after touring the offices located on Matucana Street.
A total of 155,707 people participated in the extraordinary registration process in addition to 108,550 immigrants who applied for visas through the regular channels.
This extraordinary process registered 49,828 Haitian, 31,682 Venezuelan, 22,819 Colombian and 14,941 Bolivian citizens, representing the four countries with the greatest number of inscriptions. Meanwhile, the three regions with the largest turnout of foreigners for the regularization process were the Metropolitan, Tarapacá and Valparaíso regions.
“From now on, we all need to be very clear that the times of illegal immigration are behind us. Chile has been and will continue to be an open and welcoming country for foreign immigration, but, as can be expected and as a commonly shared view among the vast majority of Chileans, this immigration must obviously comply with our laws,” the President said, accompanied by ministers, undersecretaries, members of congress and mayors.
The President toured the facilities of the new office of the Department of Foreign Services and Immigration situated in the iconic building of the former Moletto textile factory, outfitted with modern facilities to serve the public.
The office has 38 service modules in operation and has a potential capacity to receive 1,000 people in an area of 2,800 m2. It is also equipped with a preferential attention room with nine modules, one social assistance room, one legal counsel room and one breastfeeding room, a parking area for baby strollers and bathroom facilities for the disabled, ensuring an optimal service for all users.