It was a balmy Friday night late last month as hundreds of gay men, lesbians and transgender people gathered in Parque Duarte in the heart of Santo Domingo’s Colonial Zone to meet friends, drink and even cruise. A handful of "bugarrones" or male prostitutes discreetly worked the crowd, but Ariel, a 25-year-old from the northern city of Santiago, described the park as a haven of sorts for the capital’s LGBT residents.

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