A DR News Article

I'd like to share a piece of news I came across about the DR. It's not happy news. It's actually rather disturbing, but since I had no idea this type of thing went on I figured it would be good to clue you all in also.

Friday, August 25 Migrant slayings trigger tensions between Haiti and Dominican Republic PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) -

Haiti recalled its top diplomat to the Dominican Republic on Thursday after three Haitian migrants were beaten and burned to death in the neighbouring country, an official said. Pierre Willy, Dominique Gilberto and Paul Cinius were attacked Aug. 16 in a small suburb just south of the Dominican capital, Santo Domingo, where they worked at a furniture factory, Dominican police said. According to the Dominican Attorney General's Office, the three men, aged 19 to 22, had been drinking alcohol with a group of Dominicans at a neighbourhood store. Later that night, the Dominicans went to a house where the Haitians were staying and demanded money from one of them. After he refused, the group jumped the men, beat them, doused them with a flammable liquid and set them ablaze, the Attorney General's Office said in a statement. The men died days later from burn wounds in a Santo Domingo hospital. In response to the killings, Haiti's interim government recalled its charge d'affaires "for consultation," said Jean Daniel Lafontant, a spokesman for Haiti's Foreign Affairs Ministry. "The Haitian interim government energetically condemns these criminal acts. It deplores that such deeds have occurred at a time when significant efforts are being made to lastingly improve relations between the two countries," a Foreign Ministry statement said. The Dominican National Police said Thursday it had formed a commission to investigate the attack and find the killers. The slayings seemed likely to further inflame growing tensions between the uneasy Caribbean neighbours, which share 390-kilometre border on the island of Hispaniola.