18776: Blanchet: AMNESTY INTERNATIONA

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Max Blanchet <MaxBlanchet@worldnet.att.net>

From: <Caribb-non-esc@amnesty.org>

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
PRESS RELEASE


AI Index:       AMR 36/007/2004    (Public)
News Service No:         36
18 February 2004

  Haiti: preparations for possible refugee outflows underway as human rights
abusers lead armed rebel forces


The joining of notorious perpetrator of human rights violations Louis
Jodel Chamblain and his followers with armed rebels accused of past abuses
in the Central Plateau would create another devastating threat to respect
for human rights in Haiti, Amnesty International said today.

        Over the last two days former paramilitary leader Louis Jodel
Chamblain, convicted of involvement in the assassination of a prominent
pro-democracy activist ten years ago, has led a group of former soldiers
from Haiti's disbanded military in attacks in the Central Plateau. Other
attacks by alleged former soldiers in the area, such as the July 2003
ambush and killing of four Ministry of the Interior employees, have
previously been denounced by Amnesty International as human rights abuses.

        "As rebel forces, under leadership of convicted perpetrators of
human rights violations, expand their control in the centre and north of
the country, and the population of conflicted areas is cut off from
supplies of food and medicines, fears of a mass population outflow from
Haiti are bound to increase," Amnesty International stressed.

        The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has offered to help
neighbouring countries in forming contingency plans for a mass exodus of
Haitians.

        Authorities of the neighbouring Dominican Republic have reportedly
closed border crossing points in affected areas.

        United States officials have said that the US is considering
setting up a camp within the US military base at Guantánamo Bay to
temporarily house Haitians intercepted while trying to flee the country by
boat for the US.

        "Given the precedent of a dozen years ago, in which Haitians were
interdicted on the high seas by US forces, transferred to Guantánamo Bay
and subjected to inadequate screening procedures for asylum claims, there
is a real risk of violations of the rights of asylum seekers in the event
of a mass outflow from Haiti, " Amnesty International said.

        "US authorities, and those of other nearby countries, must ensure
that they meet their obligations under international refugee law as they
plan for a possible mass outflow from Haiti, so that no breaches of their
duty towards fleeing Haitians occur."

Background Information
In September 1995 Louis Jodel Chamblain was among seven senior military
and paramilitary leaders convicted in absentia and sentenced to forced
labour for life for involvement in the September
1993 extrajudicial execution of Antoine Izméry, a well-known pro-democracy
activist. Chamblain had gone into exile to avoid prosecution.

        Antoine Izméry was gunned down in the Church of the Sacred Heart
in Port-au-Prince on 11 September 1993, while attending mass. The mass was
being held to commemorate the fifth anniversary of a massacre committed
during an attack on Jean Bertrand Aristide, then a parish priest, on 11
September 1988 at the St. Jean Bosco Church in La Saline, a shanty town on
the outskirts of the capital.

        Chamblain has reportedly joined forces with the leaders of the
armed opposition based in Gonaďves. Another of the leaders, Jean Pierre
Baptiste, alias "Jean Tatoune", is also a former paramilitary leader who
was sentenced to forced labour for life for participation in the 1994
Raboteau massacre.

        Louis Jodel Chamblain and Jean Tatoune both belonged to the
paramilitary organisation FRAPH, formed by military authorities who were
the de facto leaders of the country following the 1991 coup against
then-President Aristide.  FRAPH members were responsible for numerous
human rights violations before the 1994 restoration of democratic
governance.

        After the 5 February attack in the Artibonite town of Gonaďves,
unrest spread to nearly a dozen towns in the center and north of Haiti.
Concerns are increasing about the humanitarian situation in the towns
under control of anti-government forces and other areas cut off by the
conflict.

        Reports emerging on the 16 February rebel attack on Hinche,
capital of the Central Plateau department, indicate that former soldiers
were among the uniformed assailants who took control of the town under the
leadership of Chamblain.  The police commissioner and two others were
reportedly killed by the attackers, while other police officers fled.
Rebels burned the police station and freed the inmates of the local prison
in Hinche, and are also said to have burned police stations in the nearby
towns of Maďssade and Pandiassou.

For more information, please see: "Haiti: Abuse of human rights: political
violence as the 200th anniversary of independence approaches",
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGAMR360072003



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