Dominican Republic Humanitarian Crisis

The current humanitarian crisis happening in the Dominican Republic is the reflection of the humanitarian crisis in Latin America. The exodus of people and the migration laws criminalizing this community are making the situation worse. Last week thousands of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic were threaten to be deported even if they were born in Dominican soil.

The Dominican government implemented a migration system in which these people could apply for residency and have a legal status on the country. The high prices of this process prevented thousands of people from actualizing and making the necessary changes to have Dominican residency.

There is racial profiling as well in the island. If the police officers see a person that is darker than a ‘true Dominican’ or looks Haitian will immediately be arrested and start a process of deportation against them.

Francine McKenna says: “On June 19 the United Nations High Commission of Refugees appealed to the Government of the Dominican Republic to make sure people who the agency said were arbitrarily deprived of their nationality as a result of a 2013 ruling of the Dominican Constitutional Court will not be deported. Their residency status and citizenship rights are now uncertain. “The Court’s ruling and the subsequent regularization plan which gave individuals born in the Dominican Republic until mid-June to regularize their status, impacts tens of thousands of people”, explained a spokesman for the UNHCR, Adrian Edwards. “Most of them were born in the Dominican Republic and are of Haitian descent,” he added”[1].

It is a crisis that reflects the hate rooted in our blood for people that is different than us. The situation in the DR represents the ideas and conduct of many Latin American countries that reject their brothers and sisters from the same land. Mexico is a clear example of this reflection. Mexican soil is one of the most dangerous countries for immigrants as they are assaulted, kidnapped and murdered by the system that criminalizes their right to migrate and find a better future in another country.

There is also another example in history that reminds me of the “cleansing” of a country and McKenna refers to it: “The Washington Post reported that the government actually described the current deportation actions as a “cleansing” of the country’s immigration rolls. The article quotes Cassandre Theano, a legal officer at the New York-based Open Society Foundations, who said comparisons between the Dominican government’s actions and the denationalization of Jews in Nazi Germany are justified. Denial of citizenship was one of the first acts perpetrated against Jews in Nazi Germany”.

Migrating is not a crime and everyone has the right to be part of a country other than their homeland.

[1] Haitians in Dominican Republic threatened with mass deportation by Francine McKenna; published on June 22, 2015 10:57 a.m. ET. Market Watch. Online.

Mexico’s Turmoil

It is very difficult to not have an opinion on what happened and is happening in Mexico and the mid-term elections. The truth is that not much will change, although the protests and the social movements are intensify more and more. Unfortunately, the change that Mexico needs will not happen overnight. The problem, as many have agreed, is rooted in years of corruption and oligarchies. From north to south, Mexico is experiencing the breakage in its social and civic standards, costing the country thousands of dead and missing people.

It has been over eight months since 43 students from the state of Guerrero went missing; there was not reasons for them to disappeared other than being students and demand a change in Mexico. The protest that followed up the disappearance of these students united social classes in Mexico. The middle and working class marched along the main streets of Mexico City to ask the president an answer of these disappearances. For the first time in many years Mexico united to push for a change.

Now, the government is asking for people to vote, to keep the ‘democracy’ going, but all they want is to keep the oligarchy running and keep the pueblo in the shadow of illiteracy and ignorance.

The government is trying as hard as they can to indicate the ‘transparency’ of the electoral process by inviting and paying Nobel Peace Prize Rigoberta Menchu to oversee the voting process, but the fallacy of this action was the opinions Menchu made about the 43 student missing in which she made it seem as it was the students’ fault for have been killed and not the state’s fault.

From North to South, Mexico is in turmoil, and I doubt this will change in the following months.

For more information about the mi-term elections check Latin America’s Moment Blog post about this topic: http://blogs.cfr.org/oneil/2015/06/08/mexicos-midterm-elections/#more-4220

Latin American Scientists

Latin America is a tragic land. Is a land of violence but also of beauty, the colors of its culture and the passion in which everything happens makes it one of the most unusual locations in the world, and I would argue, one of the most beautiful.

Most of the media coverage for Latin America concentrates on the disasters, violence, deaths, poverty, etc., but I believe it is important to mention that in the sciences Latin America has breakthrough research.

The website Latinamericanscience.org with the partnership with Qué pasa magazine completed a list of 30 Latin American Scientist under 40 years old making breakthrough research in the sciences:

“From conserving biodiversity in Central American rainforests to exploring the cosmos from Chile, the Latin American continent harbors a wealth of scientific talent. Qué Pasa magazine and LatinAmericanScience.org have compiled a list of 30 scientists under 40 that are doing promising work in areas as diverse as particle physics and neuroscience” – Latinamericanscience.org

The importance of emphasizing the sciences in the continent is of magnificent benefit to the future of this land. The rich melting pot of ideas and the diversity of its people and environment make it a perfect place to conduct scientific research.

One of the things I did notice while looking at this list is the lack of Central American people doing scientific research. I believe one of the reasons is because this area of Latin America is highly affected by the political turmoil, in addition to the high rate of violence in this territory. To change this reality, the Central American governments should concentrate more on providing better education for their youth and make this one of the priorities of their political agenda, as the youth is the only solution to save the future of the countries of Central America.

To check these scientists visit the following website: http://latinamericanscience.org/2014/05/latin-american-scientists/