Members of the Dominican Republic military corps stationed at the border with Haiti. Photo courtesy CaribbeanNationalWeekly.
HAITI/DOMINICAN REPUBLIC--A powerful component of 9,748 members of the Dominican Republic military corps has been deployed along the entire land border with Haiti, including 120 specialists in the direction of the intelligence of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who have containment among their priorities, the containment of the illegal trafficking of undocumented migrants.
This strong military presence at the border between the two countries was ordered by Minister of Defense, Lt. General Carlos Luciano Díaz Morfa, who explained that the armed forces manage and improve actions to control the illicit trafficking of people, goods and drugs.
“The old-fashioned idea of a neglected, poorly guarded border region laden with ill-equipped and isolated military posts, is a thing of the past,” the neighbouring country’s top military official said on Monday.
Minister Díaz Morfa revealed that border surveillance is in charge of 8,672 members of the Army, who have now been joined by 153 Navy personnel, 83 Air Force members, 702 from the Specialised Corps of border security Cesfront, 18 from the specialised Port Security Corps and 120 intelligence specialists from the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The bulk of the 9,748 deployed across the cordon separator between Haiti and the Dominican Republic is made up of officers, soldiers and assimilated, all part of the security and defense system of land and sea borders.
At the moment, 2,691 soldiers of the Fourth Brigade are deployed on the northern border; 2,654 soldiers from the Third Brigade in the central section and 2,677 soldiers from the Fifth Infantry Brigade on the south-west border, including intelligence personnel from the Dominican Republic Army’s G2.
The Dominican Republic’s Navy has two port commands, Manzanillo and Cabo Rojo, with 82 soldiers and officers. The Air Force, which is part of the land border control tasks, has a detachment and a small airport in Cabo Rojo, and another in Dajabón, with a staff of 83 members and three patrol planes.
Meanwhile, the border posts and their surroundings in Dajabón, Elías Piña, Jimaní and Pedernales are under the surveillance of 702 soldiers from Cesfront. The Port Security Corps has a facility in Manzanillo and another in Cabo Rojo, with 18 members.
There are 128 motorised units, including 18 vehicles for patrolling in high difficulty terrain; 145 surveillance camera systems and 52 military border posts. Some 24 checkpoints are regularly deployed on formal and informal routes, traveling to preserve the element of surprise.
A set of eight joint and interagency task forces in the region of Enriquillo, Vicente Noble, Los Pilones, Jicomé, Estero Hondo, Copey and the coordinated border efforts in Carrizal and Jimaní maintain the current border security strategy.
The visual surveillance system is connected to the Command, Control, Communication and Security Center-C5i to monitor in real time, all movements at border crossings, military posts, checkpoints, informal routes and other avenues.
Lt. General Díaz Morfa reported developing a strategy to monitor informal crossings that are detected in steep areas where it is difficult to travel, often used as roads to bypass surveillance.
For the Dominican Republic Minister of Defense, the protection of the border strip constitutes one of the priorities of his ministry, of its armed forces and specialised units, being one of the main axes of its current strategic plan, approved by the state-major for the period 2021-2024. ~ Haiti Libre ~
