  Context. The Vista Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) near-infrared
variability survey explores some of the most complex regions of the Milky Way
bulge and disk in terms of high extinction and high crowding. Aims. We add a
new wavelength dimension to the optical information available at the American
Association of Variable Star Observers International Variable Star Index
(VSX-AAVSO) catalogue to test the VVV survey near-infrared photometry to better
characterise these objects. Methods. We cross-matched the VVV and the VSX-AAVSO
catalogues along with Gaia Data Release 2 photometry and parallax. Results. We
present a catalogue that includes accurate individual coordinates,
near-infrared magnitudes (ZY JHKs), extinctions Aks, and distances based on
Gaia parallaxes. We also show the near-infrared CMDs and spatial distributions
for the different VSX types of variable stars, including important distance
indicators, such as RR Lyrae, Cepheids, and Miras. By analysing the photometric
flags in our catalogue, we found that about 20% of the stars with measured and
verified variability are flagged as non-stellar sources, even when they are
outside of the saturation and/or noise regimes. Additionally, we pair-matched
our sample with the VIVA catalogue and found that more than half of our sources
are missing from the VVV variability list, mostly due to observations with low
signal-to-noise ratio or photometric problems with a low percentage due to
failures in the selection process. Conclusions. Our results suggest that the
current knowledge of the variability in the Galaxy is biased to nearby stars
with low extinction. The present catalogue also provides the groundwork for
characterising the results of future large variability surveys such as the Vera
C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time in the highly crowded and
reddened regions of the Galactic plane, as well as follow-up campaigns for
