The Regional Directorate for Communities (DRC) will welcome, during this week, a delegation from Cape Verde that integrates members of the Cape Verde Institute of Communities and the International Organisation for Migrations from the same country. The reasons for this visit concern the need to exchange information and experiences, since both regions experience the problem of deportation from common host countries, particularly from the USA, where Azoreans and Cape Verdeans have lived together for several centuries.

In the context of this visit, the DRC is organising several meetings between Cape Verdean technicians and the institutions that focus their action on the reception and integration of deportees in the field. In addition to the meetings already held with the DRC and members of the Extended and Restricted Network of Sociocultural Support to Human Mobility, which aimed to make them acquainted with the structures and entities working in the area of deportation before and during the departure of deportees,and after their arrival in the archipelago, the Cape Verde delegation will have the opportunity to visit the Novo Dia Association and ARRISCA as well as some tourist sites of São Miguel.
 
During the meeting with the Extended Network, the Regional Director of Communities, Graça Castanho, had the opportunity to point out that "it is a pleasure for the DRC to welcome representatives from the institutions addressing the issues of deportation in Cape Verde as there is the need to seek the best solutions for the problems which are common to both archipelagos in order to build equitable and inclusive democratic societies."

Being deportation a problem that demands effective responses in host countries as well as in the countries of origin, the Regional Director noted that "the Regional Directorate for Communities is currently implementing the LEGAL programme (Legalisation Effort of the Government of the Azores and Logistics) in the communities and organising, in a joint action with Cape Verdeans and Brazilians residing in the USA and Canada, an International Symposium on Human Rights and Quality of Life addressed at the Portuguese speaking communities living in those countries to take place in Massachusetts on November 8 and 9. Deportation, health, education, community leadership and human rights are some of the issues under discussion at this event."

As a result of the work meetings, joint projects in the area of support to emigrants and returnees are being developed with the purpose of brining the two archipelagos closer, "bearing in mind that networking is nowadays the only means to ensure the success of common policies and the interests of geographically small regions, but which have provided important contributions to the world," concluded Graça Castanho.