12246: May 2002 Migration News--excerpts on Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Stuart M Leiderman <leidermn@cisunix.unh.edu>


Date: Sat, 4 May 2002 19:22:44 -0700 (PDT)
From: Migrant News PLM <migrant@primal.ucdavis.edu>
To: migrant@primal.ucdavis.edu
Subject: May2002 MN Issue

MIGRATION NEWS
Vol. 9, No. 5, May, 2002

Dominican Republic-Haiti. The Dominican Republic said it reduced the
number of visas granted to Haitians from 7,000 to 3,000 a month.  The
Dominican Republic foreign minister said: "we consider that 3,000 visas
are enough, especially because we have realized that most of the Haitians
entering with a (tourist) visa come to work."  Haiti said that the move
was an effort to "stop to the corrupt practice of Dominican officials
selling visas to Haitians in [the five] Dominican consulates" in Haiti.
The Dominican consul in Haiti's capital of Port-au-Prince will be allowed
to grant 1,700 visas a month, and in other major cities Cap-Haitien, 500;
Juana Mendez, 350; Belladere, 225; and Anse-a-Pitre, 225.

The minimum daily wage in Haiti is about $1.35, and over half of the
work force is unemployed.

Human Rights Watch asked the Dominican Republic on April 3, 2002 to
avoid race-based discrimination and protect Dominicans of Haitian descent
from expulsion; it alleged that Black Dominicans without papers are
sometimes sent to Haiti.  Dominican Republic Foreign Minister Hugo
Tolentino Dipp responded that: "the Dominican Republic has a very heavy
burden," in dealing with the thousands of Haitians who cross the border
illegally.

The Haitian Embassy in the Dominican Republic said that it had provided
birth certificates to 17,000 Haitians in the Dominican Republic.  The
Haitian Embassy said that there were 400,000 Haitians in the Dominican
Republic without documentation.

The Haitian National Police are reportedly training a special unit that
will be in charge of guarding the Dominican/Haitian border against
illegal migration, with the Haitian consul asserting that in order to be
effective, there needs to be a police or military officer stationed every
ten or 15 meters along the border.

A convicted Haitian drug dealer argued that he should not be returned to
Haiti because he will be tortured there, but the Board of Immigration
Appeals ruled on a 13-6 vote that Jeandis Esteme can be deported to
Haiti.  Esteme cited the 1984 United Nations Convention Against Torture,
which the United States signed; the BIA concluded that being sentenced to
prison in Haiti was not torture: "Substandard prison conditions in Haiti
do not constitute torture within the meaning of" U.S. law.