Caricom alarmed by Dominican Republic ruling on nationality

The Caribbean Community is calling on the Dominican Republic to adopt measures to protect the human rights of those made vulnerable following a September 23 ruling of its constitutional court on nationality which modifies retroactively legislation which bestowed citizenship on persons born in that territory from 1929-2010.

“As a result of the ruling, which considers migrants entering the Dominican Republic since 1929 and their children born in the country as “in transit” and requires them to obtain nationality, a large number of persons who are part of the very fabric of Dominican society would be stripped of Dominican citizenship,” the Caricom Secretariat said in a press release issued yesterday.

An estimated 210,000 Dominican-born people of Haitian descent who were legally considered Dominican and contributed, as