Border wall? President of Chile orders construction of ‘physical barriers’ to contain immigration

The new president of Chile, José Antonio Kast (left), during his inauguration ceremony, on March 11, 2026. Pablo Sanhueza/ Reuters The new president of Chile, José Antonio Kast, ordered the construction of “physical barriers” on the border with Bolivia. The measure aims to discourage irregular immigration, one of the right-winger’s main campaign promises. ✅ Follow the g1 international news channel on WhatsApp “I request your active collaboration in increasing the number of employees” and “I also ask you to collaborate with the construction of physical barriers to stop the entry of illegal immigration” on the border with Bolivia, Kast told the Army commander, Pedro Varela, during an event in which he signed his first six decrees, three of them related to irregular immigration. A total of 337,000 foreigners currently live without documentation in Chile, according to official data. Check out some moments from José Antonio Kast’s victory speech Kast’s inauguration Far-right lawyer José Antonio Kast assumed the Presidency of Chile on Wednesday (11). In his inauguration speech, in front of thousands of supporters who gathered in front of the presidential palace, Kast asked his ministers to carry out audits to determine the situation in which the leftist Gabriel Boric handed over the government. “They are handing us a country in worse conditions than we could imagine”, criticized Kast – the most radical conservative leader in the country since the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. In his first message to the nation, he further promised that the “emergency government” will not be a “slogan”. “To face emergencies in security, health, education, employment, Chile needs an emergency government and that is what we will have,” he stated. Kast added that “to Chile’s adversaries”, as he calls national and foreign criminals, “we will persecute, we will find, we will judge and we will condemn”. His discourse of order attracts Chileans who seek to curb crime. In recent years, Chileans have abandoned the desire for a new Constitution that arose with the social upheaval of 2019. Boric, who participated in the inauguration ceremony, was one of the main drivers of this process, which failed after two attempts at reform. A devout Catholic and father of nine children, Kast represents “a conservative right the likes of which have not been seen since the return to democracy” in 1990, says Rodrigo Arellano, political analyst at the Development University, a private institution. Chilean President Kast participates in activities after his inauguration in Santiago. REUTERS/Juan Gonzalez

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