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DomRep citizens of Haitian descent losing their nationality
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
WASHINGTON, USA (AFP) — Dominican Republic citizens of Haitian descent are retroactively losing their nationality and becoming people without countries due to strict new rules, a rights group told a leading monitoring organisation yesterday.
Digna Adames, head of the Jesuit Service to Refugees and Migrants (CIDH) in the Dominican Republic -- which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti — described the situation as a "civil genocide."
Adames told the Inter American Human Rights Commission (IACHR), an independent branch of the Organisation of American States based in Washington, that her group has documented some 1,500 cases of Dominicans of Haitian descent running into trouble when they attempt to renew identity cards or try to obtain government services.
"They want to throw us into the garbage through this civilian genocide that does not allow us to access any (government) service," said Ana Maria Belique, who testified to the Commission.
Belique said that Dominican authorities rejected her birth certificate as illegitimate when she went to renew her identity card, but she took the case to court and had it recognised on appeal.
"It's as if having been born from a Haitian father was the worst thing that could happen," she said.
Francisco Quintana, an attorney for CEJIL, another rights group, told the IACHR that stricter rules to obtain Dominican nationality are disproportionally affecting Dominicans of Haitian descent.
Roberto Saladin, the Dominican Republic's OAS representative, insisted there was "no state policy" to revoke citizenship to Dominicans of Haitian descent.
People in Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic have long looked down on their darker-skinned, Creole-speaking neighbours in economically-depressed Haiti.
Haiti is still recovering from a devastating 7.0-magnitude quake in January 2010 that leveled the capital and killed more than 225,000 people, and left one in seven people homeless in a nation that was already the poorest in the Americas.
The humanitarian situation has been further aggravated by a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 5,000 people, food insecurity for 4.5 million and an active hurricane season that has already destroyed homes and crops.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz1bmv35zZ0
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
WASHINGTON, USA (AFP) — Dominican Republic citizens of Haitian descent are retroactively losing their nationality and becoming people without countries due to strict new rules, a rights group told a leading monitoring organisation yesterday.
Digna Adames, head of the Jesuit Service to Refugees and Migrants (CIDH) in the Dominican Republic -- which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti — described the situation as a "civil genocide."
Adames told the Inter American Human Rights Commission (IACHR), an independent branch of the Organisation of American States based in Washington, that her group has documented some 1,500 cases of Dominicans of Haitian descent running into trouble when they attempt to renew identity cards or try to obtain government services.
"They want to throw us into the garbage through this civilian genocide that does not allow us to access any (government) service," said Ana Maria Belique, who testified to the Commission.
Belique said that Dominican authorities rejected her birth certificate as illegitimate when she went to renew her identity card, but she took the case to court and had it recognised on appeal.
"It's as if having been born from a Haitian father was the worst thing that could happen," she said.
Francisco Quintana, an attorney for CEJIL, another rights group, told the IACHR that stricter rules to obtain Dominican nationality are disproportionally affecting Dominicans of Haitian descent.
Roberto Saladin, the Dominican Republic's OAS representative, insisted there was "no state policy" to revoke citizenship to Dominicans of Haitian descent.
People in Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic have long looked down on their darker-skinned, Creole-speaking neighbours in economically-depressed Haiti.
Haiti is still recovering from a devastating 7.0-magnitude quake in January 2010 that leveled the capital and killed more than 225,000 people, and left one in seven people homeless in a nation that was already the poorest in the Americas.
The humanitarian situation has been further aggravated by a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 5,000 people, food insecurity for 4.5 million and an active hurricane season that has already destroyed homes and crops.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz1bmv35zZ0
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