The Dominican Republic is moving carefully on immigration

Your article on the Dominican Republic contains unfounded accusations while neglecting to report on the global observers who are in the Dominican Republic and have called our program a success in regularizing the documentary status of more than 350,000 people (“Dominicans, Haitians unite over crisis,” Metro, July 5).

Foreign Minister Lener Renauld in an address to the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS) said it was important to avoid the massive deportations “which would lead to splitting households and tearing children away from their parents”.

The communique issued after the meeting clearly indicated the level of distress and seriousness that leaders attached to the issue, calling on the Dominican Republic to let good sense prevail in handling such a delicate issue.

He says even now, pregnant women are being facilitated by the Dominican Republic and scholarships are being granted to Haitian students.

OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro Lemes said he was hoping to “resolve it once and for all”.

Ambassador Ares says the removal of persons of Haitian descent was done in a spirit of humanity. Otherwise they could face deportation. Subsequently, hundreds of thousands of individuals of Haitian descent, many having never visited their neighbor and would-be homeland, now reside and are an intregral component of the Dominican Republic and its social fabric.

(4) Take proactive measures to protect the life and property of Dominicans of Haitian descent as well as prosecute and deter any vigilante or state-sponsored violence against them.

The Ambassador is also stressing that Haitians were not kicked out initially, but were assisted with returning voluntarily in keeping with their human rights.

The Haitian government “understands this as a way to get the pressure, the popular demands, off its back”.

He said the Dominican Republic welcomed dialogue, but no one could force policy on the sovereign nation.