(Reuters) – The Dominican Republic announced that its foreign minister will travel to New York on Tuesday to participate in a United Nations Security Council meeting convened to discuss the situation in neighboring Haiti.
During his trip, Foreign Minister Roberto Alvarez will also meet with Haiti’s new Prime Minister Garry Conille and his foreign minister, Dominique Dupuy, who have been in the United States this week meeting with multilateral lenders.
The two Caribbean countries, which share the island of Hispaniola, have a long history of tense relations.
The Dominican Republic has argued it bears the brunt of insecurity in Haiti, where armed gangs concentrated in the capital have displaced over half a million residents and pushed nearly 5 million people into acute food insecurity.
The Dominican government has built a wall on its border with Haiti where it has reinforced patrols and last year deported over 200,000 Haitian migrants, prompting criticisms from the United Nations and human rights groups.
Dominican President Luis Abinader has called for other nations to contribute more funds and personnel to a U.N.-backed security mission to help Haitian police restore order. A first contingent landed last week but it is unclear when the rest might arrive.
The mission’s initial 12-month mandate is set to expire in October.
(Reporting by Sarah Morland; Editing by Anthony Esposito and David Alire Garcia)
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