52 | Report on the Situation of Human Rights in the Dominican Republic 90. 91. Along these lines, as it has contended in the past, the Commission deems it is necessary to reiterate that any legal practice, norm, or interpretation that supports refusal of the registration of birth and the issuance of birth certificates for children born in the Dominican Republic of Haitian migrant workers and who met the requirements for securing Dominican nationality constitutes an arbitrary deprivation of nationality and therefore a violation of Article 20.3 of the American Convention on Human Rights. 83 The Commission appreciates the fact that in early October 2013, within days of Constitutional Court judgment TC/0168/13 being handed down, President Danilo Medina held a meeting in the Palacio Nacional with Dominicans of Haitian descent and civil society organizations dedicated to the defense of this group’s basic human rights, to learn firsthand how the decision affected them, and to find a social and humane solution to the problem it created. In his remarks about the meeting, President Medina stated that “there were young people present who were pursuing their studies, walking 18 kilometers every day; when they were about to receive their high school diploma, it turned out that they had no identification document and therefore could not get their degree.” He went on to say that “I said I was sorry –I didn’t apologize- for everything they experienced in all this time and that I was going to launch a process of consultations to ascertain what we could do in coordination with the organs that have some authority vis-à-vis the measures that have been taken.”84 1. Historical background of Haitian migration to the Dominican Republic 92. As a preliminary consideration, the Commission believes it is important to recall that the States of this hemisphere emerged after declaring their independence from European colonial powers. 85 One of the main characteristics of European colonialism in the Americas and its legacy was the creation of race-based colonial societies, where the colonists were clearly differentiated from the indigenous and Afrodescendant populations. One of the main consequences of colonialism was the multiple forms of discrimination and racism to which indigenous peoples and Afrodescendants have been subjected across the length and breadth of the American hemisphere. Slavery only served to reinforce forms of discrimination and racism against Afro-descendants. Slavery as both the foundation of many colonial economies for centuries in the Caribbean and also the root (not merely 83 See: IACHR, Report on the Situation of Human Rights in the Dominican Republic, 1999; see also; I/A Court H.R., Case of Expelled Dominicans and Haitians v. Dominican Republic. Preliminary Objections, Merits, Reparations and Costs. Judgment of August 28, 2014. Series C No. 282, para. 277, 293, 298, and 299. See, Hoy, Medina confirma pidió “excusas” a descendientes haitianos. October 9, 2013. See, also, Acento, Danilo buscaría solución a caso de dominicanos de ascendencia haitiana. October 7, 2013. The Commission has held that discrimination, racism, xenophobia and intolerance in the Americas have their genesis in racial and cultural preconceptions brought by European conquerors and nurtured for centuries of colonization. See IACHR, Second Progress Report of the Special Rapporteur on Migrant Workers and Their Families in the Hemisphere. 2001, para. 81. 84 85 Organization of American States | OAS