Law 169-14, which establishes a special regime for persons born in the national territory who were irregularly enrolled in the dominican Civil Registry, and regarding naturalization, in its first article sets as a goal to establish: a) a special regime in the benefit of children of foreign non-resident parents, who were born in the national territory between june 16, 1929 and April 18, 2007 enrolled in the books of the dominican Civil Registry based on documents not recognized by the current norms for these purposes at the moment of enrollment (Group A); and b) the registration of children of foreign parents in an irregular migratory status who were born in the Dominican Republic and do not appear enrolled in the Civil Registry (Group B).
Definitions for profiles of persons pending a nationality solution UNHCR serves
Law 169-14 beneficiaries:
- Group A: Persons born in the Dominican Republic between 1929 and 2007, from parents with a “nonresident” migratory status, whose births were registered in the Ordinary Book of the Dominican Civil Registry. For this populatio, literal A of the first article of Law 169-14 establishes the validation of their birth certifiates and the issuing of identity and electoral ID’s that confirm their dominican nationality. UNHCR also serves their descendants in the process of obtaining state-issued documents that credit their legal identity.
- Group B: Persons born in the Dominican Republic between 1929, from parents in an “irregular” migratory status, whose births were never registered in the Dominican Civil Registry. According to section B of Law 169-14, and within a 180 days term after enactment (until 01/02/2015), this population agreed to a special regularization procedure, with the objective of, within two years of having obtained their permanent residency (RP-1) and their foreigner identity card in the case of persons over 18 years old, being able to request naturalization. UNHCR also supports their descendants in obtaining state-issued documents that credit their legal identity.
Descendants of mixed couples: Persons who, no matter their date or place of birth, one of their parents is dominican with credible documents, and the other parent is a foreigner or a dominican pending a nationality solution.
According to the Second National Immigrant Survey (ENI) carried out in 2017 by the Dominican Statistics Office (ONE), there is an existing population born in the Dominican Republic before the constitutional change of January 26, 2010 from both parents who are foreigners, who lacked birth certificates from any country, which leads us to infer that, at least those born before April 18, 2007 (Resolution 02-2007 para la puesta en vigencia del Libro-Registro de nacimiento de niño de madre extranjera no residente en República Dominicana), did not apply to the Plan established by Law 169-14. For this population, currently there is no accesible legal pathway to dominican nationality.