Dominican Republic should deal with statelessness ‘crisis’

Santo Domingo.- Amnesty International (AI) and CivilSociety representatives are slated to visit Presidency chief of staff GustavoMontalvo today Wednesday to deliver at least 50,000 requests from 134 countriesasking the Government to adopt "urgent measures" to deal with statelessnessin the Dominican Republic, which it calls a “crisis.”

Quoted by listin.com.do Amnesty on Tuesday said the meetingis scheduled for 11am at the National Palace, and the week of the third

It said the Constitutional Court "stripped tens ofthousands of people, mostly of Haitian descent, of Dominican nationality."

In addition, AI activists and people affected by the rulingwill protest peacefully outside the Constitutional Court at 10:30am Friday.

In September 2013 the high court ruled that Juliana DeguisPierre, a woman of Haitian descent, couldn’t be Dominican because her parents’ statuswas of "foreigners in transit" (without legal residency).

The ruling paved the way for a national program toregularize undocumented foreigners and repatriations since September last year,mostly people from Haiti.

On Tuesday Amnesty said the Constitutional Court turned thoseaffected into "ghost citizens, severely limiting their opportunities to goto school, get a job and even travel freely in the country."

"The new administration of president (Danilo) Medinaprovides a unique opportunity for the Dominican government to revert some ofthe many evils created with the Constitutional Court ruling three years ago,following up efforts in 2014, finding new solutions for the tens of thousandsof Dominicans who are severely affected by this measure," said RobinGuittard, AI representative for the Caribbean region.