Dominican Republic – A Brief Introduction The Dominican
Republic, a country of the Hispaniola Island is the second
largest island in the Caribbean region. It is neighbor to the
nation of Haiti, the only other country on the island. The
Dominican Republic was inhabited by the Tainos since the 7th
century and was conquered by Christopher Columbus in 1492. This
was the time when the European settled in Santo Domingo, the
current capital of Dominican Republic. The island saw
enslavement, starvation, torture, and forced labor under the
Spanish rule. When the French landed on the island of Hispaniola
in 1795, there was utter confusion all over the island. The
Spanish were successful in removing Frenchmen from Saint-
Domingue, which later in 1804 became independent with the name
of Haiti, while France ruled the eastern Santo Domingo region.
After around three centuries of Spanish and French rule over the
island, the nation got its independence in 1821 under a colonial
judge’s rule. However, Haitians again conquered t