Refugees International and the Robert F Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights will conduct a joint visit to the Dominican Republic from May 11 to 17. The visit will follow up on Refugees International’s previous mission of November 2006 to focus on the situation of stateless persons of Haitian origin in the Dominican Republic.

Decades of political and socio-economic crises have forced large numbers of Haitians to find their way to neighboring countries in the region, particularly to the Dominican Republic. Despite the Dominican Constitution’s provision that all those born in the Dominican Republic - with the exception of children born to diplomats or persons “in transit” – are Dominican, people of Haitian origin have commonly been denied access to Dominican identity documents. Many are been rendered de facto or legally stateless by this practice. Following the passing of a new Dominican migration law, access to documentation has become even more difficult for people of Haitian origin, and there are cases of cancellation of documents, creating more cases of statelessness. The situation is even more difficult for children of Haitian refugees.

During this mission Refugees International and the Robert F Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights will examine the current situation of access to the rights of citizenship for people of Haitian origin in the Dominican Republic, and devise strategies for engaging the Dominican authorities and civil society organizations on this issue.