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Trujillo Invites 1,000 Young Exiles to Settle in Sosua; Project Requires $230,000

June 19, 1940
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President James N. Rosenberg of the Dominican Republic Settlement Association today announced plans for settlement of 1,000 refugee children and youths from England and France, under a new offer by Generalissimo Rafael L. Trujillo, besides 200 refugees previously scheduled for colonization in San Domingo.

Equipment and one-year maintenance for the 1,200 will cost $230,000, in addition to transportation expenses, Rosenberg said. Details of transportation have not been worked out yet, but Rosenberg expressed the hope that free transportation would be provided by Britain or Canada or aboard a Red Cross ship.

General Trujillo’s offer was contained in the following cable: “I have recommended to the Dominican Government the adoption of a plan whose final details will immediately combine with the proposition of offering asylum in this Republic to a number of children and young men coming from England and France who will settle in the settlement at Scsua as an extension of the covenant celebrated between the Dominican Government and the Association for the establishment of colonists in the Dominican Republic.”

Rosenberg’s cable of reply follows: “Your noble action in extending settlement project for the unfortunate children and young people is magnificent. Shall try raise necessary monies. Meantime, in name of those children, wherever and whoever they are and whatever their religion or nationality, profound thanks.”

The 1,000 refugees will include 500 children and 500 youths between the ages of 16 and 20. “Our ability to expand the number whom we will aid will be controlled entirely by the money we can get,” Rosenberg said. He added that he had the cooperation and promises of assistance in arranging transportation from George L. Warren, executive secretary of the President’s Advisory Committee on Political Refugees; Stophen V.C. Morris, secretary of the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees; Sir Herbert Emerson, director of the Committee, and Robert T. Pell of the State Department.

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