Dominican Republic to deport 10,000
undocumented Haitians a week
The Haitian government announced on Wednesday it will seek to "reduce the excessive migrant populations" in the country by implementing a plan that would expel 10,000 undocumented Haitians a week, potentially forcing them to return to a country fraught with gang violence that has killed 3,600 people in Haiti this year.
The Dominican Republic unveiled a plan Wednesday to start expelling 10,000 undocumented Haitians a week as part of a crackdown on migration from its troubled neighbor.
"This operation aims to reduce the excessive migrant populations detected in Dominican communities," presidential spokesman Homero Figueroa said, adding the expulsions would start "immediately" and be done "according to strict protocols that ensure respect for human rights."
The government said it took the decision in light of the international community's "slowness" in restoring stability in Haiti, large parts of which have been overrun by criminal gangs.
After many months of delay, a UN-approved force led by Kenya has been sent to Haiti to try to restore order.
"We warned at the United Nations that either it and all the countries that had committed themselves (to helping Haiti) act responsibly in Haiti, or we will," President Luis Abinader said.
Since coming to power in 2020, Abinader has taken a tough line on migration from destitute and violence-plagued Haiti.
He built a 164-kilometer (102-mile) concrete wall between the two countries and promised to extend it when he was handily re-elected in May for a second term.
His government has also dramatically ratcheted up deportations, expelling 250,000 undocumented Haitians in 2023 alone.
The plan announced Wednesday would more than double that number in a year -- more than the 495,815 Haitians living in Dominican Republic, according to official statistics.
Figueroa said the government had drawn up a plan to identify and dismantle networks engaged in human trafficking from Haiti.
The government has also said it would step up drone and camera surveillance of the border.
Fleeing Haiti's collapse
Dominican Republic, which covers two-thirds of the island of Hispaniola and is mainly Spanish-speaking, has a history of fractious relations with its much poorer neighbor, where French and Creole are spoken.
Haitians have for decades sought to carve out a better life in the Dominican Republic, a Caribbean tourism hotspot with one of the fastest-growing economies in Latin America.
The collapse of Haiti's economy and its descent into gang warfare followed a devastating earthquake in 2010, with each crisis exacerbating the flow of Haitians across the border.
The UN human rights office says more than 3,600 people have been killed this year in gang violence in Haiti.
More than 700,000 people have been displaced from their homes, over half of them children, the UN's International Organization for Migration said Wednesday in Geneva.
During the presidential campaign, both Abinader and his main rival rejected pressure from the international community for the country to allow in more people fleeing Haiti's collapse.
Haitian communities in the Dominican Republic report widespread discrimination and racism, including from the state and security services.
(AFP)
Border Patrol apprehends 64 Haitian migrants
abandoned by their smugglers
At least 70 killed in gang attack on Haitian town,
UN says
The death toll from a grisly attack Thursday on a small Haitian town by the heavily armed Gran Grif gang has risen to at least 70, the UN human rights office said Friday, adding that women and children were among those killed.
The tally of victims killed in this week's brutal attack on a small town in central Haiti by heavily armed gang members has risen to at least 70, the U.N. human rights office said Friday.
Bodies lay strewn on the streets of Pont-Sondé following Thursday’s attack in the Artibonite region, many of them killed by a shot to the head, Bertide Harace, spokeswoman for the Commission for Dialogue, Reconciliation and Awareness to Save the Artibonite, told Magik 9 radio station.
Initial estimates put the number of those killed to 20 people, but activists and government officials have been gradually accessing areas of the town and discovering more bodies. Among the victims is a young mother, her newborn baby and a midwife, Herace said.
“We are horrified by Thursday’s gang attacks,” the U.N. Human Rights Office of the Commissioner said in a statement.
It said 10 women and three infants were among those killed, and at least 16 others seriously injured, including two gang members hit during an exchange with police.
The office said gang members reportedly set fire to at least 45 homes and 34 cars.
The motive remains unclear for what was one of the biggest massacres in the central region in recent years. Attacks of that kind have taken place in the capital of Port-au-Prince, 80% of which is controlled by gangs, and they typically are linked to turf wars, with gang members targeting civilians in areas controlled by rivals. But Pont-Sondé is considered part of Gran Grif's own territory.
The gang was created after former Haitian legislator Prophane Victor began arming young men in the area to secure his election and control over the Artibonite region nearly a decade ago, according to a U.N. report.
Both Victor and the leader of Gran Grif, Luckson Elan, were sanctioned by the U.S. last month.
The gang attacked Pont-Sondé before dawn on Thursday and encountered little resistance, Herace said, though she said that contrary to some reports, police officers did try to repel the gang.
“The gang had total control of the area,” Herace said.
Haiti’s government has deployed an elite police unit based in the capital of Port-au-Prince to Pont-Sondé following the attack and sent medical supplies to help the area’s lone hospital overwhelmed by dozens of people injured.
“This heinous crime, perpetrated against defenseless women, men, and children, is not only an attack on these victims, but on the entire Haitian nation,” Prime Minister Garry Conille said in a statement Friday.
Gang violence across Artibonite, which produces much of Haiti’s food, has increased in recent years.
In January 2023, the Gran Grif gang was accused of attacking a police station in Liancourt, located near Pont-Sondé, and killing at least six officers. Violence unleashed by the gang also forced the closure of a hospital in February 2023 that serves more than 700,000 people.
(AP)
Four tons of cocaine intercepted near Canary Islands
Patrol boats from Spanish and French customs have intercepted four tons of cocaine in a cargo ship near the Canary Islands. The ten crew members, including a Dutchman, have been arrested.
The ship was sailing under the Tanzanian flag at a great distance from Lanzarote, the easternmost island of the Atlantic archipelago off the coast of northwest Africa. Turks and Azerbaijanis were among the other detainees.
The cargo ship attracted attention because it sailed from Turkey to West Africa without loading or unloading any goods and then, after making "erratic maneuvers," headed for the Iberian Peninsula, according to the authorities. The suspects wanted to transport the drugs in smaller boats to the coast of Spain, AD reported.
According to the newspaper, the Spanish and French authorities found the cocaine in a hidden compartment between the holds of the cargo ship, which was "very difficult to access."In the Netherlands, the street value of cocaine is currently 52 euros per gram, as estimated by the National Drug Monitor. The value is even higher in other European countries, between 62 and 85 euros. This means that the 4 tons of cocaine intercepted near Lanzarote have a value of 248 to 340 million euros, according to AD.
Spain is a significant gateway for drugs into Europe due to its close ties to former colonies in Latin America and its proximity to Morocco, a major cannabis producer.
Reporting by ANP and NL Times
No comments:
Post a Comment