24937: (news) Chamberlain: Haiti-Former Premier (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

Reposting a post that didn't go out.



From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By ARIANA CUBILLOS

   PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 1 (AP) -- The former prime minister under ousted
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide is flying into exile after months in
detention, a Western diplomat and a radio station reported Sunday.
   Former Premier Yvon Neptune, who had been held without charge for 10
months in connection with political killings during the February 2003
rebellion that ousted Aristide, will be flown to the neighboring Dominican
Republic by helicopter on Sunday, the diplomat said. The diplomat spoke on
condition of anonymity because a formal announcement has not been made.
   Independent Radio Kiskeya reported that Neptune already had been flown
out late Saturday after doctors said a hunger strike had left him near
death. The discrepancy could not immediately be reconciled.
   An official at Port-au-Prince's international airport said they were on
standby for the event but had not yet received confirmation from officials
in Haiti's interim government, who could not be reached for comment.
   Neptune initially was considered a traitor by Aristide loyalists when he
handed power to an interim president, Boniface Alexandre, within days of
Aristide's Feb. 29 flight as rebels led by former soldiers were converging
on the capital.
   At the time Neptune resisted pressure from diplomats and interim
government officials, installed after U.S. troops arrived, to go into
exile.
   After his arrest in June, he became a rallying point for both militants
demanding the release of hundreds of Aristide officials and loyalists
jailed without charge, as well as for human rights activists demanding he
be tried. Aristide is in exile in South Africa.
   The interim government of Prime Minister Gerard Latortue accused Neptune
of orchestrating the killing of Aristide opponents in the western town of
St. Marc during the rebellion, allegations he denies.
   Latortue had resisted months of international pressure to release
Neptune.