Hatians Face Deportation From Dominican Republic As "Regularization" Looms

[Zillamaster55]

[url=http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/17/us-dominican-immigration-idUSKBN0OX23220150617?irpc=932]Source[/url]
[quote]Hundreds of thousands of Haitian migrants and Dominicans of Haitian descent faced the risk of deportation from the Dominican Republic on Wednesday as a deadline for enforcement of a new immigration law approached.

Dominican officials say anyone lacking identity documents or who has not registered for a so-called "regularization" program before the Wednesday night deadline could face deportation.

The Dominican government says the changes to its nationality and immigration laws aim to tackle illegal migration from neighboring Haiti. Human rights groups say the move is rooted in longstanding racism and xenophobia in the Dominican Republic towards darker-skinned Haitians.

Over the last century an untold number of Haitians have crossed into the more prosperous Dominican Republic to escape political violence or seek a better life, many working as sugar cane cutters, house cleaners or babysitters.

Human rights groups say the new law could impact hundreds of thousands of these migrants and a smaller number of Dominican-born people of Haitian descent who lost citizenship after a constitutional court ruling in 2013 that has faced international criticism.

That ruling reversed the right of citizenship for foreigners born in the Dominican Republic, stripping children of Haitian migrants of their Dominican nationality, human rights groups say.

Dominican President Danilo Medina has said there will be no mass deportations. But undocumented Haitian migrants can be deported within 48 hours of the deadline, government officials have said. Those who register under the regularization program will have 45 days during which their applications are verified.

The government says more than 210,000 people have registered under the program. Those deemed eligible could earn a two year temporary migrant status.

The Dominican army has 2,000 troops ready to help coordinate the removal of people who fail to meet legal requirements to remain in the country. Four "Welcome Centers" are being set up to receive undocumented people, the government said.

Local media have reported the government has dozens of buses on standby to transport undocumented people to the Haiti border.

For the last few weeks long lines of Haitian migrants and Dominican-Haitians have formed outside a government office in the capital seeking to register under the regularization program, as police in riot gear stand guard.

On Tuesday, Milaine Nocent beamed as she showed a reporter a copy of an official document obtained after four days of standing in line to register her children as Dominicans.

"Now we can stay," she said with evident relief.

Augustin Wasner, a construction worker who said he lacked the needed documents, vowed that whatever happened he would never return to Haiti.

"I have brought many papers, I talked with many men but I can’t get inside," Wasner said.

There is no official data on how many Dominicans of Haitian descent are in the country, human rights groups say, as many never obtained documents with the civil registry. Less than 9,000 have been able to register under a separate naturalization program which expired in February, according to Human Rights Watch.[/quote]

[Jamsponge]

[quote]Dominicans of Haitian descent[/quote]
That's alarming.

[editline]18th June 2015[/editline]

This whole thing is alarming, but they're deporting people who might never have even visited any country other than the Dominican Republic.

[Download]

[quote]Four "Welcome Centers" are being set up...[/quote]

That's some Orwellian shit right there.

[Sableye]

its really crazy how good-side, bad-side that whole place is, the dominican republic is a much nicer place to live than the hati side

[YouWithTheFace.]

The legacy of Trujillo lives on in the DR sadly. Though this thing goes even further.

You can't be black in the Dominican republic because black=Haitian and haitian= bad.

Hearing stories of xenophobic abuse towards Haitian by Dominicans is incredibly depressing. And no one stops them because its basically the norm.

[Deunan]

Tbh, I don't really consider this incredibly draconion as this is part of it.
[quote]Dominican officials say anyone lacking identity documents or who has not registered for a so-called "regularization" program before the Wednesday night deadline could face deportation.
[/quote]
The article also quotes that more than 210k people have registered as it is. The thing is, how else is a country supposed to figure out who's living in it.

Also as another note - people who lack citizenship can't actually be deported under international law. But many will probably be found to be haitans under ius sanquinus. Doubt the DR really considers ius soli to be that impotant.

[Wizards Court]

[QUOTE=YouWithTheFace.;47996918]The legacy of Trujillo lives on in the DR sadly. Though this thing goes even further.

[B]You can't be black in the Dominican republic because black=Haitian and haitian= bad.[/B]

Hearing stories of xenophobic abuse towards Haitian by Dominicans is incredibly depressing. And no one stops them because its basically the norm.[/QUOTE]

i don't get it, isn't most of the dominican republic population mixed or black? how does that work?

[Trounark]

Long story short: There's a law from around 1929 about immigrant regulations and such, which states that children of illegal immigrants born in Dominican soil aren't Dominicans (unlike the case of USA).

So, like everything in this shitty country, the law wasn't being applied and the government turned a blind eye since the issue of illegal immigration from Haiti to DR wasn't such a big of a deal (according to them) until the mid 2000 when there was flood of Haitians after the Earthquake of 2010 and René Préval literally saying to the Haitians: "Anyone who can get out of Haiti should do it ASAP" the Haitians crossing the border became something uncontrollable and unlike some parts of USA, the border here is barely a road, with a few bridges and a nearly dry river, so it was easy for them.

The sad part is that the Haitian government refuses to help their fellow citizen with the papers needed to regulate their status in this country saying is not their problem, ignoring that their constitution states that every children of an Haitian is Haitian regardless where they're born.

But is easier to shove all the weight of the problem to DR. Venezuela gave 40 millon dollars to the Haitian government to help with the papers need for the regularization process, and guess what happened? they stole the money. They even leveled up the prices of the paperwork (which should be free for their citizen) so even more people were left without documents here.

The current Haitian governement has a really strong anti-dominican position which is unfair when you take in consideration that this government helped Martelly win the elections in Haiti and we were the first to send aid when the earthquake happened. The current president donated a school to Haiti using our taxes, and they were so grateful they named it after a dictator who was behind one of the biggest massacres against the DR by Haitians.

Also you should check this: [url]https://translate.google.com.do/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Faquinones.diariolibre.com%2F%3Fp%3D876&edit-text=&act=url[/url]

[editline]20th June 2015[/editline]

[QUOTE=YouWithTheFace.;47996918]The legacy of Trujillo lives on in the DR sadly. Though this thing goes even further.

You can't be black in the Dominican republic because black=Haitian and haitian= bad.

Hearing stories of xenophobic abuse towards Haitian by Dominicans is incredibly depressing. And no one stops them because its basically the norm.[/QUOTE]

I would like to hear these stories. Haitians aren't treated harshly here, hell they are treated WAY worse everywhere else in the Americas.

[editline]20th June 2015[/editline]

Pretty convenient how this article forgets to mention that this "regularization" program has been available for a year already. That's right, they've had [B]a year[/B] to get their documents in order, and they chose to do it right at the deadline.

[Wizards Court]

[QUOTE=Trounark;48008271]Long story short: There's a law from around 1929 about immigrant regulations and such, which states that children of illegal immigrants born in Dominican soil aren't Dominicans (unlike the case of USA).

So, like everything in this shitty country, the law wasn't being applied and the government turned a blind eye since the issue of illegal immigration from Haiti to DR wasn't such a big of a deal (according to them) until the mid 2000 when there was flood of Haitians after the Earthquake of 2010 and René Préval literally saying to the Haitians: "Anyone who can get out of Haiti should do it ASAP" the Haitians crossing the border became something uncontrollable and unlike some parts of USA, the border here is barely a road, with a few bridges and a nearly dry river, so it was easy for them.

The sad part is that the Haitian government refuses to help their fellow citizen with the papers needed to regulate their status in this country saying is not their problem, ignoring that their constitution states that every children of an Haitian is Haitian regardless where they're born.

But is easier to shove all the weight of the problem to DR. Venezuela gave 40 millon dollars to the Haitian government to help with the papers need for the regularization process, and guess what happened? they stole the money. They even leveled up the prices of the paperwork (which should be free for their citizen) so even more people were left without documents here.

The current Haitian governement has a really strong anti-dominican position which is unfair when you take in consideration that this government helped Martelly win the elections in Haiti and we were the first to send aid when the earthquake happened. The current president donated a school to Haiti using our taxes, and they were so grateful they named it after a dictator who was behind one of the biggest massacres against the DR by Haitians.

Also you should check this: [url]https://translate.google.com.do/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Faquinones.diariolibre.com%2F%3Fp%3D876&edit-text=&act=url[/url]

[editline]20th June 2015[/editline]

I would like to hear these stories. Haitians aren't treated harshly here, hell they are treated WAY worse everywhere else in the Americas.

[editline]20th June 2015[/editline]

Pretty convenient how this article forgets to mention that this "regularization" program has been available for a year already. That's right, they've had [B]a year[/B] to get their documents in order, and they chose to do it right at the deadline.[/QUOTE]

that link you gave seems very biased towards the DR to say the least.

[QUOTE]Current smear campaign against the country is cruel, inhuman and very interested and manipulated by certain circles of power. There are joined with revolutionary enthusiasm France, United States, Venezuela and the Caribbean. To cap it all Dominican Republic or even a member of Caricom. And I fear that it was a position of rejection of the rulers in that regional organization.
This is the most hospitable country in the world. And solidarity passion unleashed when the Haitian earthquake is one of the most beautiful gesture that a country has made on the other.

...

I swear, I think it's unfair that the most hospitable country in the world be judged without knowing its reality, its history and needs. Many criticize me, others will agree with me. This is my opinion with absolute honesty.[/QUOTE]

not saying what you said is/isn't true/partially true but... considering the reports of other news sites like the guardian...

[url]http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/07/dominican-republic-haiti-long-history-conflict[/url]

[QUOTE]But three years on, the goodwill seems to have dissipated and old tensions resurfaced. Just over a week ago the Dominican Republic's highest court ruled to revoke the citizenship of children of illegal Haitian migrant workers – a measure to be applied to anyone born after 1929, and thus affecting not only migrants' children, but their grandchildren and, in some cases, even great-grandchildren.

...

Today the border continues to inspire fear. Dominican-born children of Haitian descent number around 210,000, in a nation of 10 million. Haitians have long been migrant workers, with many finding seasonal employment in sugar cane fields or other low-wage work, which has become especially crucial in the aftermath of the earthquake. And, like immigrants elsewhere, they are often blamed for taking jobs. At the same time, racialised fears of "Haitianisation" are still regularly voiced by politicians and sections of the media, though many Dominicans have expressed shock and anger over the court's decision. But violence is still directed at Haitians; crimes against them often go unreported; and many continue to live in dire poverty.[/QUOTE]

[Trounark]

[QUOTE=Wizards Court;48008472]that link you gave seems very biased towards the DR to say the least.

not saying what you said is/isn't true/partially true but... considering the reports of other news sites like the guardian...

[url]http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/07/dominican-republic-haiti-long-history-conflict[/url][/QUOTE]

That article seems a little inaccurate, at least what you quoted. Haitians take jobs that no other Dominicans want to take. They get hired a lot because they work for a cheap salary. Nobody complains that they take jobs. However it is true that people have kind of an anti-Haitian mentality, and they do live in poverty because of the shitty pay.

The point I was trying to get across is that there are two sides of the coin, people tend to call us racists without even exploring our side of the conflict, which is simply unfair. I do agree that 1929 seems pretty exaggerated.