Since the start of the plan to increase deportations, multiple human rights violations have been reported, including mass expulsions and deportation of unaccompanied children and adolescents. Allegations of human rights violations in the Dominican Republic have led to an increase in attacks on civil society organizations and activists promoting and defending the rights of Haitian immigrants and their descendants.

Washington D.C. – We, the undersigned organizations, who have worked for decades for the protection and promotion of human rights in the Dominican Republic, express our deep concern over the alarming escalation of hostility, harassment and violence towards human rights defenders and organizations in the Dominican Republic.

Last October 2, President Luis Abinader announced the immediate implementation of a plan to deport more than 10,000 people in “irregular migratory situations” on a weekly basis. Since then, various civil society organizations working to protect the rights of migrants and stateless persons have denounced multiple human rights violations, such as collective expulsions, deportation of unaccompanied children and adolescents, confiscation of identity documents, and overcrowding in detention centers.

As a result of these denunciations, aggressions, stigmatizing speeches and attacks on civil society organizations and human rights defenders have increased. Recently, on October 8, members of a group calling itself the “Movimiento Código Patria” (Homeland Code Movement) threatened members of the Movimiento Sociocultural de Trabajo Humanitario y Ambiental (MOSCTHA). Only four days later, Franklin Dinol, coordinator of the Reconoci.do Movement, was arbitrarily detained. This is not the first time that civil society organizations or their members have been targeted. In December 2022, an illegal raid took place at the offices of the Movement of Dominican-Haitian Women (MUDHA).

The recent attacks are part of a broader context of racism, xenophobia and persecution against human rights defenders in the country, which has been recognized and condemned by the Inter-American Commission, the Inter-American Court and the United Nations. Despite the seriousness of this situation, the government of Luis Abinader does not have a specific public policy for the protection of human rights defenders. Although the State has a National Human Rights Plan (PNDH), which establishes objectives to promote and defend the human rights of all persons in the country, it lacks concrete measures to safeguard those engaged in the defense of these rights, in addition to the risk situation of those engaged in the protection and defense of human rights. 

We recall that international standards establish the obligation of States to adopt public policies, legislative and regulatory measures to ensure that those who promote and defend human rights can do so without reprisals. We also emphasize that States have the obligation to investigate, prosecute and punish seriously and effectively threats, hate speech and attacks against them, since maintaining the facts in impunity can lead to their repetition and the intimidation of other defenders.

The government of Luis Abinader has the obligation to comply with the commitments made under these instruments. In this sense, the undersigned organizations urge the State to adopt a public policy that guarantees the protection of human rights defenders and to act with due diligence to investigate the aggressions committed against them.

Signed: 

• Amnesty International
• Center for Justice and International Law
• Santa Clara University Human Rights Clinic
• Colectivo #HaitianosRD
• Fundación Cónclave Investigativo de las Ciencias Jurídicas Y Sociales (CIJYS)
• Global Justice Clinic, NYU School of Law
• Institute on Race, Equality and Human Rights (Race and Equality)
• Caribbean Institute of Human Rights (ICADH)
• Sociocultural Movement for Humanitarian and Environmental Work (MOSCTHA)
• Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights