Groups rally in Haiti for immigrants in the Dominican Republic

Human rights and religious groups in Haiti have united to plan a “march for dignity” on Tuesday 21 July through the center of the capital, Port-au-Prince, in solidarity with Dominicans of Haitian descent, as well as those Haitian immigrants in the Dominican Republic.

The move comes as the government of the Dominican Republic rejected the demand of the Organization of American States to enter into dialogue with Haiti over the former’s decision to deport thousands of Haitian immigrants and Dominicans of Haitian descent.

Organizations including Support Group for the Repatriated and Refugees, the National Network of the Defense of Human Rights and the Center for Analysis and Investigation in Human Rights, plus at least eight others have rallied together to call on political parties, businesses and citizens to attend the demonstration.

In a statement released over the weekend, the groups said that the march would take place in solidarity with the thousands of Dominicans with Haitian descent, “victims of the arbitrary” sentence of the Dominican Constitutional Court that denies nationality to the children of illegal immigrants and that most deeply affects Haitians.

On September 23, 2013 the Constitutional Court of the Dominican Republic, decided that the children of immigrants without documentation who were born in the Dominican Republic after 1929, even though they are registered as Dominicans, will lose this status, despite never having set foot in Haiti, nor be able to speak the language.

​Haiti has accused the Dominican Republic of violating the human rights of Haitian immigrants and of provoking a humanitarian crisis on the shared island through immigration policies that are discriminatory towards Haitians. Meanwhile, the Dominican Republic has insisted it has a right to self-determine immigration law as a sovereign issue and has demanded an apology from Haiti for hurling criticisms at its policies.

Source: teleSUR