RFK Condemns the Bahamas and Dominican Republic Immigration Policies Affecting Haitian Children
The Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights recently condemned a new immigration policy implemented in the Bahamas and Dominican Republic, the Miami Herald reports.
According to the Miami Herald, the new immigration policy requires immigrants to provide documentation of their eligibility to work in the Bahamas and Dominican Republic.
If immigrants living in the Bahamas are unable to show the required documentation, they risk the immediate deportation of their entire family-including their children.
On Friday, Haiti recalled its ambassador to the Bahamas and summoned the Bahamas' ambassador in Port-Au-Prince to condemn the new policy.
Haiti's Prime Minister, Laurent Lamothe later explained to the Miami Herald his country's reasoning for condemning the immigration policy in the Bahamas.
"It was made clear that the Government of Haiti deplores the recent actions, and is calling on Bahamian authorities to respect the rights of Haitians in the Bahamas, especially the children who are being unfairly impacted," Lamothe explained.
Haiti's decision to condemn Bahamas' immigration policy follows an immigration raid conducted in Nassau that resulted in many detained Haitian immigrants and their children, the Miami Herald reports.
"Haitian activists told the Herald that 35 to 40 of the detainees were children, picked up with their undocumented parents," writes Miami Herald's Jacqueline Charles.
Despite Lamothe and other Haitian activists' claims of injustice towards Haitian immigrants in the Bahamas, government spokesperson, Elcott Colby denies any wrong doing from the Bahamian government.
Still, the RKC continues to oppose the Bahamian immigration policy.
In addition to the policy's requirement of immigrants to provide proof of eligibility to work in the Bahamas, children born in the Bahamas to foreign-born parents are also given a requirement to obtain a passport from their parents' country of origin within 30 days or face arrest and/or deportation, says the Miami Herald.
"These new policies mean that thousands of children in the Bahamas now live in fear of arbitrary arrest or deportation. The Bahamas must immediately fulfill its obligation to protect children no matter their status, and no matter their ethnicity," said Kerry Kennedy, President of the RFK Center.
According to Miami Herald, the Dominic Republic has also discriminated against Dominican-born children of Haitian decent.
As a result of the Dominican Republic's actions towards these children, the Dominican Republic's Constitutional Court was forced to withdraw from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
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