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A controversial new piece of legislation put forward before the Dominican Republic’s Chamber of Deputies aims to reintroduce mandatory national military service for all adult citizens between the ages of 18 and 35, encompassing both men and women for the first time in the country’s modern policy framework. The bill was introduced by sitting Deputy Elías Wessin Chávez, who has laid out an extensive administrative structure to bring the program into force if approved. Under the proposal, a new centralized government body called the General Superintendency of Military Service would be created to manage every step of the process, from initial citizen registration and selection through to the delivery of training and the integration of completed service members into the country’s Armed Forces reserve corps. Unlike traditional mandatory military models that focus solely on combat readiness, the proposed program is structured as a hybrid initiative that combines rigorous basic military and physical training with formal civic education and accredited technical vocational instruction. Proponents of the bill argue that the program will deliver a wide range of social and national security benefits: it will foster a stronger culture of personal discipline and national patriotism among young Dominicans, drive down rates of youth delinquency by providing structured, productive activity for emerging adults, equip participants with marketable job skills that improve their long-term employment outcomes, and reinforce both the country’s national defense posture and domestic emergency response capacity. To address concerns about economic hardship for low-income participants, the legislation guarantees that all selected service members will receive compensation equal to at least the national minimum wage paid by the Dominican state, as well as full health coverage through the country’s popular subsidized Senasa public health insurance system. The bill also includes carve-outs to accommodate vulnerable and exempted groups, avoiding undue hardship for populations that cannot reasonably fulfill the service requirement. Exemptions and service deferrals are written into the legislation for mothers of minor children under the age of 18, individuals formally diagnosed as physically or mentally unfit for service, active members of the national Armed Forces and national police force, and a subset of Dominican citizens currently residing or pursuing full-time education outside the country. Even with these exemptions, the legislation includes strict enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance from eligible citizens. Individuals who ignore a formal summons for military service would face temporary disqualification from holding any elected or appointed public office in the country. The proposal also includes a controversial provision that would allow the government to suspend all federal social assistance benefits for families that refuse to send their eligible children to complete the mandatory service requirement. If the bill passes both legislative chambers and is signed into law by the Dominican president, the executive branch would have a 180-day window following the formal promulgation of the law to draft and publish all the secondary regulations required to launch the new military service system, setting a clear timeline for implementation if the legislation is approved. The proposal has already sparked preliminary debate across Dominican political and civil society circles, with supporters framing it as a unifying national initiative and critics raising questions about the impact of mandatory service on young people pursuing higher education and private sector careers.

In a move designed to reinforce national disaster preparedness, Dominican Republic’s Emergency Operations Center (known locally as COE) and the national Airport Department have formalized an agreement to tighten collaborative coordination and update response protocols for crises and natural disasters across the country.

Last week, senior leaders from both entities gathered for a working meeting focused on aligning operational priorities: COE Director Erdwin Olivares sat down with Airport Department Executive Director Mérido Torres Espinal to conduct a full review of the existing capabilities that the nation’s network of heliports, hospital-connected landing zones, private airfields and public commercial airports can bring to bear when disaster strikes. From hurricanes to flash floods, the Caribbean region’s frequent extreme weather events leave Dominican Republic vulnerable to large-scale crises, making rapid deployment of emergency resources a critical policy priority.

Under the terms of the new agreement, the joint partnership will prioritize leveraging this sprawling national aviation infrastructure to cut response times for life-saving interventions. The updated framework calls for pre-coordinated access to all landing facilities to speed up the delivery of emergency aid, enable faster search and rescue missions, streamline the medical evacuation of impacted residents, and speed up the movement of critical emergency supplies and personnel across affected areas.

During the meeting, Olivares stressed that maintaining a well-coordinated, fully optimized national aviation network is non-negotiable for effective disaster response, noting that delayed access to hard-hit regions often amplifies harm to communities and complicates recovery efforts. For his part, Torres Espinal reaffirmed the Airport Department’s full commitment to delivering all required operational support, from pre-event maintenance of landing facilities to on-the-ground coordination during crises, to guarantee that emergency responses across the country are both timely and tightly integrated between all relevant government agencies.

In a dual-purpose ceremony held in Santo Domingo this week, the Embassy of Israel in the Dominican Republic formally inaugurated the start of Ambassador Oren Bar-El’s diplomatic posting, while also gathering guests to mark the arrival of the Jewish New Year 5787.

The event brought together a cross-section of key stakeholders, including senior Dominican government officials, fellow members of the international diplomatic corps, leading local and international business executives, prominent civil society figures, and representatives of national and regional media outlets.

Opening the formal remarks, Ilan Vulej, Consul and Deputy Head of Mission at the Israeli Embassy, took the opportunity to spotlight Bar-El’s decades-long, distinguished career within Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, noting the ambassador’s deep expertise in international diplomacy and bilateral cooperation. Vulej extended warm, sincere well wishes for a productive, impactful tenure during Bar-El’s time in the Caribbean nation.

In his first public address to local and diplomatic guests since arriving in the country, Bar-El expressed heartfelt gratitude to the Dominican people and government for the warm, enthusiastic welcome he has received since his arrival. He went on to underscore the deep, decades-long friendship that has defined ties between the State of Israel and the Dominican Republic, a partnership rooted in shared values and mutual respect.

Bar-El outlined the existing productive collaboration between the two countries across a range of high-priority sectors, from cutting-edge technological innovation and data-driven precision agriculture to sustainable water resource management. He also highlighted growing Israeli private investment in the Dominican Republic’s economy, which has created new jobs and expanded market opportunities for both nations.

Looking ahead to his tenure, the ambassador reaffirmed his unwavering commitment to deepening and expanding bilateral ties across all areas of mutual interest. He emphasized his goal of identifying and advancing new collaborative opportunities that will deliver tangible, shared benefits to the people of both Israel and the Dominican Republic.
Beyond the formal diplomatic proceedings, the ceremony integrated rich cultural and traditional elements of the Rosh Hashanah celebration. Renowned Israeli artist Sharon performed two beloved works: the iconic “Hallelujah” and “Morenika,” delivered in Ladino — the historic, endangered language of Sephardic Jewish communities that has preserved cultural heritage for centuries across the diaspora.

The gathering concluded with a time-honored Rosh Hashanah tradition: a ceremonial toast featuring apples dipped in honey, a centuries-old symbol that represents the collective wish for a sweet, healthy, and prosperous new year for all attendees and both nations.

In Santo Domingo, a broad coalition of Dominican civil society organizations—encompassing social, feminist, community, labor, human rights, and even religious groups—is calling on the national government to uphold its long-held 2019 stance and refuse to join the Geneva Consensus Declaration (GCD), as pressure from the former U.S. Donald Trump administration persists to push the country into signing the anti-abortion pact.

Launched in October 2020 by the United States and a bloc of supporting nations, the GCD is a politically driven international declaration structured around three core pillars. First, it explicitly rejects the existence of a universally recognized international right to abortion, holding that no country is bound by international law to fund or expand access to abortion services. Second, it emphasizes national sovereignty, claiming that every nation has the right to shape its own domestic laws, health initiatives and social policies without outside interference. Third, it centers the traditional family unit as the fundamental foundation of society and the primary source of care, welfare and support for community members.

Despite the GCD being framed as a non-binding political statement rather than a legally enforceable international treaty, the Dominican coalition has laid out a series of grave concerns over the potential far-reaching impacts of the country joining the declaration. In an official public manifesto signed by the Coalition for Women’s Rights and Life and dozens of allied groups across the nation, the organizations argue that the GCD’s core principles directly conflict with the Dominican Constitution, existing national legislation, and the country’s standing commitments to global human rights, gender equality, public health, and the rights of women and children.

Civil society leaders warn that even without legal force, the GCD’s framing could gradually reshape domestic public policy, regulatory frameworks, government decision-making, national budget allocations, and the terms of international cooperation agreements that the Dominican government enters into. One key point of contention is the declaration’s potential to disrupt the constitutional separation of powers, by pushing to restrict health policy-related decisions exclusively to legislative bodies, overriding the constitutional authority granted to other branches of government. The coalition stresses that each branch of government must retain its constitutionally assigned powers independent of external political pressure.

The groups also highlight that joining the GCD would erode existing international human rights protections for Dominican women, girls and adolescents, weakening commitments enshrined in landmark global and regional frameworks including the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and Eradication of Violence Against Women (Belém do Pará Convention).

Beyond reproductive rights, the coalition rejects the GCD’s imposition of a single, narrow definition of family, arguing that all family structures deserve equal state protection rooted in principles of human dignity, gender equality, non-discrimination, and the best interests of children.

In their formal appeal to the Dominican government, the coalition is demanding four clear actions: that officials decline to sign the declaration, that they uphold the national Constitution and the separation of powers, that they preserve the country’s existing international human rights commitments, and that they make public any ongoing negotiations, preliminary agreements or conditions linked to a potential GCD accession.