AMERICA/DOMINICAN REPUBLIC - Cardinal Jesús López Rodríguez to the media: "Criminal violence provoked by drug dealers needs to be stopped"

Santo Domingo (Agenzia Fides) - "What is happening in Santiago de los Caballeros is a scandal, we must stop the criminal violence provoked by drug dealers": with these words Cardinal Nicolás de Jesús López Rodríguez, Archbishop of Santo Domingo, reported yet another act of violence in the country. The Cardinal made these statements to a local newspaper (Listin Diario), at the end of the celebration which he presided at the Cathedral to launch the foundation "A Favor de lo bueno", an initiative of the Archdiocese of Santo Domingo and of the Episcopal Commission for the Family and Life, which aims to encourage and publicly recognize the values of the media.
The Archbishop asked the authorities to thoroughly investigate the relation of this violence with the drug trade: "We must find a solution at all costs", he said. Last week, between Thursday and Sunday, in the province of Santiago 6 people were found murdered (5 foreigners and a Dominican). Out of a total of 108 deaths in Santiago, in 2011, 24 were carried out by assassins. The spokesman for the Security of Volunteers of Santiago, Juan Ortiz, said that cases of violence registered in this state "do not have limits".
(CE) (Agenzia Fides 01/09/2011)