President Javier Milei’s government has announced changes to Argentina’s immigration system that will see foreigners charged fees for attending state universities or public hospitals.
It will also tighten requirements for overseas visitors to the country and redefine the grounds for expulsion of immigrants from national territory, confirmed Presidential Spokesperson Manuel Adorni at a press conference.
The steps, Adorni said, would make Argentina a more “orderly” country, one that “takes care of its borders and protects Argentine citizens.”
Milei’s top spokesman asserted: “This is the objective of this reform that we are going to promote.”
The headline-grabbing move is an attempt to regain the initiative. The government was criticised last week after the controversial failure of a bill in Congress that would have imposed anti-corruption rules for candidates seeking public office.
The proposed legislation failed to even win enough support to be debated in the lower house.
The move also comes with the Milei administration at odds with state universities over funding cuts to their budget.
“National universities will be able to charge fees to non-resident foreign students,” said Adorni on Tuesday, assuring that this will represent a source of income for institutes.
According to fact-checking website Chequeado, 4.1 percent of all university students in 2022, some 122,000, were born overseas, rising to 9.9 percent of postgraduates. At the popular University of Buenos Aires, 23 percent of medical students are foreign.
Adorni also revealed that the Milei administration will seek to put an end to free medical care for non-resident foreigners, indicating that the competent national, provincial or municipal bodies will determine the conditions of access, as they see fit.
“Since this measure was taken in Salta [Province], for example, care for foreigners has been reduced by 95 percent and savings of 60 million pesos have been made. This implies not only fiscal savings but also better care for the rest of the citizens who are actually residents of our country,” he said.
Adorni also said that the government would tighten requirements for those seeking to enter the country, incorporating “more crimes as grounds for preventing entry or as justification for expelling an immigrant from the country if a criminal is caught” in the act.
“If they are caught committing the crime or are detained for violating the democratic system, they will be expelled and banned from re-entering the country,” he promised.
“Those who try to enter with fake documentation or who are suspected of having a different reason for entry than the one they actually state when they pass through or complete the immigration process will remain on the other side of the border,” the spokesman added.
– TIMES/NA/PERFIL
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