International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Week for People of African Descent

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Honorable Secretary General, honorable Assistant Secretary General, dear fellow ambassadors, the Dominican Delegation wishes to express its thanks for the presentations made as part of the commemoration, with all due solemnity, of the Inter-American Week for People of African Descent in the Americas and the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Slavery and racism in the Americas and the world have been, without any doubt, among the most shameful and sorrowful episodes in the history of humanity; it is something we can never forget, and we must pursue reparations. The worth and contribution of people of African descent have been of the highest importance, and today the great majority of the peoples of the Americas proudly affirm our African descent without forgetting our past.

The Dominican Republic is a signatory to the most important international commitments providing for the guarantee and fulfillment of human rights for the well-being and development of people of African descent, including the Montevideo Consensus, in which we undertook to adopt measures aimed at eliminating prevailing inequalities, with particular emphasis on groups in vulnerable conditions.

The Dominican State has undertaken to implement international agreements aimed at the recognition and advancement of people of African descent, and has promoted public policies, measures and actions to that end.

We wish to take this occasion to highlight the recent holding in the Dominican Republic, from March 17 to 19 of this year, of the Diálogo de Tambores: Desde la diversidad cultural dominicana (Dialogue of Drums: From Dominican Cultural Diversity), with the participation of Mrs. Raquel Peña, Vice President of the Dominican Republic, and Epsy Campbell Barr, First Vice President of the Republic of Costa Rica. This important event was held with a view to continuing to strengthen, recognize and make visible the experiences of Dominican diversity.

To highlight the Afro-Dominican heritage is to promote the full and equitable participation of people of African descent in the different arenas of Dominican society. The event also included discussions, music, dance, gastronomy and the remembrance of ancestral traditions, as key strategies for strengthening recognition of Afro-Dominican identity and its contributions and for imagining inclusive futures.

Madam Chair, dear colleagues, today some 75% of the population of the Dominican Republic is of African descent, with a great diversity and blending of cultures, bound up with the Spanish and indigenous populations, among others. The African component is something that fills Dominicans with pride and is reflected in every element of social, political, economic and cultural life. We have had presidents and great political leaders of African descent, and we likewise have renowned professionals in different fields such as medicine, education, journalism, law, economics and communication, to mention only a few.

In culture, our music and dance stand out: merengue, bachata and urban rhythms. In sport, it is worth noting that some one hundred Dominican players, most of them of African descent, distinguish themselves each year in Major League Baseball in the United States; in volleyball we have our Queens of the Caribbean; and we have a growing impact and presence in basketball around the world. That said, we recognize that, like the great majority of the countries of the Hemisphere, we face great challenges in ensuring that our inhabitants have greater social inclusion, education, health services, training and jobs, toward which the Dominican Government works tirelessly.

The African component is something that fills our country with pride and is reflected in every element of our social life, in which all its inhabitants, regardless of their ethnic origin, mingle and feel proudly bound to a single identity and unity: Dominicanness.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.