At a press conference in Santo Domingo yesterday, Wednesday 31 July, the Coalition of Organizations for Haitian Immigrants in the Dominican Republic has asked for immigration issues to be separated from the ban on certain Dominican products and warned that the ban had lead to “even more xenophobic talk”.
Coalition spokesman Keder Lafortune said that the raids on Haitian people were happening systematically and outside of the parameters established by the Dominican Constitution and international human rights treaties that the country had signed and he called for them to be stopped.
He said that they had seen immigration officers taking RD$3,000 to RD$5,000 to negotiate with detainees and taking away their belongings. He also said that pregnant women and children had been mistreated and targeted for deportation.
He denounced the death of Jean Robert Lors at the hands of immigration officers and pointed out that he had the correct papers to be in the country, and said that the Coalition had demanded an inquiry into his death.
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