2026-02-28

ALONE The Dominican Republic General Directorate of Migration reported that 35,026 Haitians were deported in January 2026 alone, with 38,392 individuals apprehended during the same period. Deportations were processed through the border crossings of Dajabón, Elias Piña, Jimaní, and Pedernales. The gap between apprehensions and deportations suggests a processing backlog that will sustain elevated return flows into February and March. For full-year 2025, the Dominican Republic deported 379,553 Haitians through 6,535 migration control operations coordinated by the Dominican Armed Forces and National Police. IOM data covering all deportation sources showed 270,214 total returns to Haiti in 2025, a thirty-six percent increase over 2024, with the Dominican Republic accounting for ninety-eight percent of all forced returns globally. The January 2026 rate of 35,026 in one month, if sustained, would project to over 420,000 annual returns, exceeding even the 2025 record. Haiti is absorbing these returns against a baseline of 1.45 million internally displaced persons, 5.7 million food-insecure individuals, and gang control over most of the capital. The majority of returnees are processed through border departments that have limited municipal reception capacity and no formal reintegration infrastructure at scale. Border communities in the Northwest, Artibonite, and Sud-Est departments are absorbing secondary displacement pressure from returnees who cannot access their areas of origin due to gang territorial control or flood damage. The operational implication for humanitarian actors is a compounding displacement cascade. Forced returnees entering a country where internal movement is restricted by gang checkpoints, where 1.45 million people are already displaced, and where food insecurity affects forty-eight February 28, 2026 percent of the population creates a humanitarian pressure multiplier with no visible absorption mechanism. IOM reception points at key border crossings represent the primary documented support infrastructure.