SANTO DOMINGO.- Two U.S. State Department officials investigate the situation of undocumented Haitians in the country and the Dominican Government’s migratory policy.

David Robinson, temporary undersecretary for topics of the Western Hemisphere, responsible for Central America, Cuba and the Caribbean, and Willard Smith, assistant director of the Office for Caribbean topics, met yesterday with Dominican Foreign Relations minister Carlos Morales and Central Electoral Board president (JCE) Julio Cesar Castaños Guzmán.

They are also slated to meet with the ministers of the Economy, Temístocles Montas, of Interior and Police, Franklin Almeyda, and Supreme Court president Jorge Subero.

Castaños said the U.S. officials stated their interest in the case of Haiti and the migratory problem. He said he told them that "the Board neither gives nationality, nor repeals nationality nor administers the migratory status of the people; the JCE grants identity cards to foreigners who are residents here.”

He also said they spoke about the Dominican migratory precariousness regarding the border security regime, which he also described as precarious. "What we most spoke about was the phenomenon of the undocumented, the lack of identity of a large part of the foreign population that lives in the country."

The JCE president said it’s the third time he talks with U.S. officials on the Haitian topic. "We cannot deny that problem that it’s real, that we have a national undocumented Haitian mass."