Dominican Republic
Mine Ban Policy
The Dominican Republic signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997 and ratified it on 30 June 2000, becoming a State Party on 1 December 2000. The Dominican Republic has never used, produced, imported, exported, or stockpiled antipersonnel mines, including for training purposes. The Dominican Republic has stated that it has not enacted domestic implementing legislation because it is not mine-affected and does not stockpile antipersonnel mines. The Dominican Republic submitted its fourth Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report on 10 March 2009, but has not provided subsequent annual reports.
The Dominican Republic did not attend any Mine Ban Treaty meetings in 2011 or the first half of 2012.
The Dominican Republic is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW), including CCW Amended Protocol II on landmines and CCW Protocol V on explosive remnants of war, but has not provided national transparency reports for either protocol.
Cluster Munition Ban Policy
The Dominican Republic signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 10 November 2009 and ratified on 20 December 2011. The convention entered into force for the Dominican Republic on 1 June 2012.
Ratification legislation was approved by the Senate on 21 March 2011, but it is not known if this includes implementation measures to enforce the ban convention.[1]
As of 7 May 2014, the Dominican Republic still had not provided its initial Article 7 report for the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which was originally due by 28 November 2012.
The Dominican Republic actively participated in the Oslo Process and supported a strong convention during the Dublin negotiations in May 2008.[2]
The Dominican Republic has regularly participated in meetings on cluster munitions. A representative from the Ministry of Defense of the Dominican Republic participated in a regional workshop on cluster munitions held in Santiago, Chile in December 2013, which issued a declaration committing to join efforts that permit the early establishment of a cluster munitions-free zone in Latin America and the Caribbean.[3] The Dominican Republic did not attend the convention’s Fourth Meeting of States Parties in Lusaka in September 2013 or intersessional meetings held in Geneva in April 2014.
The Dominican Republic has voted in favor of UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolutions condemning Syria’s cluster munition use, including Resolution 68/182 on 18 December 2013, which expressed “outrage” at “continued widespread and systematic gross violations of human rights…including those involving the use of…cluster munitions.”[4]
The Dominican Republic is party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.
Use, transfer, production, and stockpiling
In February 2008, the Dominican Republic stated that it “does not use, stockpile, produce, or have anything to do with cluster munitions.”[5]
[1] The ratification bill was number 00249-2011-PLO-SE. Senate of the Dominican Republic Secretary-General, Order of the Day, No. 00032, 2 March 2011, AGENDA00032-PLO-02-03-2011-SE. See also CMC, Cluster Munition Monitor 2011 (Ottawa: Mines Action Canada, October 2011), p. 207.
[2] For details on the Dominican Republic’s cluster munition policy and practice up to early 2010, see ICBL, Cluster Munition Monitor 2010 (Ottawa: Mines Action Canada, October 2010), p. 144.
[3] “Santiago Declaration: Toward the early establishment of a Cluster Munitions Free Zone in Latin America and the Caribbean,” presented to the conference by Christian Guillermet, Deputy Permanent Representative of Costa Rica to the UN in Geneva, Santiago, 13 December 2013.
[4] “Situation of human rights in the Syrian Arab Republic,” UNGA Resolution 68/182, 18 December 2013. The Dominican Republic voted in support of a similar resolution on 15 May 2013.
[5] Statement of the Dominican Republic, Wellington Conference on Cluster Munitions, 22 February 2008. Notes by the CMC.