Sample Letter to President Aristide

President Jean-Bertrand Aristide
Palais National
Champs de Mars
Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Dear President Aristide,

I am writing to express my concern about the plight of thousands of Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent who are regularly being summarily and arbitrarily expelled from the Dominican Republic. 

As you know, since 1999, a new wave of mass deportations began under the previous Dominican administration and continue today under President Mejia.  Contrary to Dominican and international law, the government regularly picks up, forcibly detains and deports persons suspected of being Haitian.  Parents are separated from children, and families are destroyed because of this attempted racial cleansing.  An estimated 12,000 of these people have been deported in March of this year alone.

I applaud your past outspokenness with regard to the treatment that Haitian workers receive at the hands of the Dominican Republic, as your government in 1991 was the first in Haiti to address this problem.  However, I believe that bi-lateral discussions and agreements should go beyond those which allow for Haitian workers to emigrate to fill vacant jobs in Dominican cane fields and for repatriation of undocumented Haitians.  

Although I am aware that Haiti is currently facing an internal political crisis, I strongly urge you prioritize this issue which will doubtlessly refocus some of the country’s energies in a productive manner.  Specifically, the Government of Haiti should reignite and strengthen the political debate with the Dominican Republic with a view to forging an agenda for dialogue regarding the treatment of Haitian immigrants including:

• Encouraging the Dominican Republic to apply its own national laws and international law through the American Convention on Human Rights, to which it is a party.  These laws expressly prohibit the deportation of individuals without due process and mass deportations under any circumstances, and
  
  
• Insisting on the establishment of mechanisms to oversee compliance with these laws.  One possibility includes reinforcing the ad hoc bilateral committee on Haitian / Dominican issues and empowering it to oversee the migration process.  

Sincerely,

cc:     
Prime Minister, Jean-Marie Cherestal

Minster of Justice, Camille LeBlanc

Minister of Foreign Affairs,