Speaking on a television program, Guy Lamothe, acting Haitian ambassador in the DR, said that Haitian women that cross the frontier to give birth are in transit and merely seek better medical care. He said regardless of their being born here, there is no question that those children are Haitians. He favored the Haitian government building hospitals along the frontier to offer services to these women. The director of the regional hospital of Santiago recently advocated that the DR lobby to secure international assistance to build a hospital along the Haitian frontier. He said Dominican medics could staff the hospital. Lamothe said that only humanitarian interests are behind the efforts of non-governmental organizations that assist Haitian women to cross the frontier to give birth. He said the Haitian women cross over because of the unequal life conditions on both sides of the frontier. He spoke on the television program, "Diplomacia, Politica & Comercio", produced by David Toribio on Telesistema, Channel 11. In his opinion, it is up to the DR to decide whether to grant Dominican citizenship to the children of Haitians that have been living in the DR for years. Lamothe said that in May 1995, then President Jean Bertrand Aristide decreed that the Haitian embassy in the DR could issue legal identity documentation to Haitians residing in the DR. He said that the Haitian Constitution recognizes the children of Haitians as Haitians through the third generation, regardless of where they are born. He said it is not true that Haitians born here are stateless since they have the right to the nationality of their parents. He praised the decision of the Dominican government to issue identity cards to the thousands of Haitians that do not have any legal identification. This is so because most Haitians cross the frontier without any legal documentation. In Haiti it is more common for a person not to have any legal documentation than for the person to have legal documentation.
