The crisis in the violence-ravaged Caribbean country of Haiti was the central theme of the visit of US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in the Dominican Republic on Friday, the Associated Press reported, quoted by BTA.
Blinken arrived on a one-day visit to the capital, Santo Domingo, after being in Haiti on Thursday to support a Kenyan-led, UN-backed mission to fight gangs rampaging there. The US Secretary of State has discussed with Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader his concerns about Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic.
Abinader told reporters his administration was troubled by the apparent lack of resources for the mission and the thousands of inmates who escaped after gangs stormed Haiti's two largest prisons earlier this year as part of a coordinated attack.
The crisis in Haiti has led to a sharp increase in the number of migrants trying to enter the Dominican Republic, Abinader said, adding that they are overwhelming schools and hospitals.
In recent years, the Abinader administration has been criticized for its treatment of Haitian migrants and those born in the Dominican Republic to Haitian parents. The government has largely closed airspace to Haiti and is building a wall along the border between the two countries, AP said.
Blinken noted that the Dominican Republic has the largest economy in the Caribbean and is one of the fastest growing in Latin America. As a boost to this growth, Blinken announced a $3 million investment through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to improve workforce training and build industrial parks in the Caribbean nation.
On Thursday, Blinken announced an additional $45 million in humanitarian aid to Haiti and said he supports the creation of a United Nations peacekeeping operation as a way to provide funding and resources to fight gangs and restore security in Haiti.
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