“The additional armed forces are not being sent to stop Venezuelans from crossing, but to understand who is arriving, and what kind of help each person needs,” Torquato Jardim, the minister of justice and public safety, told reporters on Wednesday.

The military is in the process of setting up a field hospital in Roraima to provide basic care to Venezuelans, many of whom have arrived malnourished.

But local officials have had tense discussions with their federal counterparts about aid, expressing concern that providing humanitarian assistance could make Roraima even more of a magnet for migrants.

In Colombia, most of those who legally cross the country’s porous border do so on foot at the Simón Bolívar Bridge, just outside Cúcuta, where migration officials say around 30,000 people cross daily. Some buy rice and pasta to take home. Others, with only a suitcase, plan to stay and start anew.

As she waited in line at the border to have her passport stamped, Cailey Domínguez, 25, said she was planning to continue on to Peru, where her sister lives. Like many in the line that extended for hundreds of yards around the immigration checkpoint, she said she was hopeful of what lies ahead while heavy-hearted about abandoning her homeland.