In the past, it is alleged that terrorists of all stripes had taken advantage of tourist friendly policies in the Dominican Republic. Recently, security measures in the country have been enhanced. But events in 2011 and 2015 highlight the vulnerabilities of the migration controls to keep out world known drug traffickers, smugglers, criminals, mafias and terrorists.
It is now known that Arab terrorists behind the 9-11 terrorist attack on the Twin Towers in New York City had “vacationed” in Puerto Plata at the hey days of when they were sought for terrorist attacks in Paris, France. That was in 2011. Listin Diario journalist Carolina Pichardo also shared that Puerto Plata was a meeting point for Mohamed Atta, head of the 9-11 terrorist attack in New York City, just three weeks before the attack. Reportedly, then Dominican consul in Hamburg, Germany Dra. María de los Ángeles Peña revealed that the Egyptian pilot that crashed the American Airlines flight into the Twin Tower had requested and obtained a tourist visa to vacation in the country. Peña said she would learn about this after she was contacted by the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States after it was determined the visa had been issued by a Dominican consulate in Germany.
More recently, in 2015, Amedy Coulibaly, known as a French Islam terrorist who held up a Jewish supermarket where several persons were killed including Charlie Hebdo publication journalists that year, was also in the country. 26-year old Hayat Boumedienne, at a time when she was sought by the French police as a suspected accomplice of her common law husband Amedy Coulibaly, who was the main suspect for the Montrouge, Paris 2015 shooting in France, supposedly vacationing in Puerto Plata. At the time she was considered on the run and armed and dangerous.
Listin Diario reports that in February 2014, Interpol revealed the capture of 20 fugitive foreign criminals that were living in the country. These persons face charges for drug trafficking, homicide, fraud, asset laundering, bank robbery, rape, among others. Among the 20 that were captured in the country were: Serbian Ivan Ivan Sivkovic, who had laundered a considerable amount of money and was sought for bank fraud; Slovenian Hari Presetnik, sought for bank fraud, Mexican drug trafficker Antonio Avalos Valencia. All reported with long stays in the country.
Another case was the use of the country as a base by accomplices of former El Salvador President Elías Antonio Saca (2004-2008) to launder around US$300 million from corrupt actions in El Salvador.
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Listin Diario
Fuego a la Lata
17 September 2018
