a1647: Haiti-Ex-Dictator (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By MICHAEL NORTON

   PORT-AU-PRINCE, April 11(AP) -- A court ordered the release of a former
military dictator on Thursday, nearly a year after he was arrested for
allegedly plotting to overthrow the government, his lawyer said.
   The three-member Appeals Court overruled a Jan. 26 decision by an
investigating magistrate to keep Prosper Avril in prison, siding with an
earlier ruling that the arrest last year was arbitrary and illegal, defense
attorney Rigaud Duplan said.
   It was unclear whether authorities would abide by the decision to free
Avril immediately, though Duplan said the ruling was "legally binding."
   Avril, a 65-year-old ex-lieutenant general, once was chief of
presidential security under dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier, until Duvalier's
ouster in 1986. He later seized power in September 1988, heading a group of
soldiers who ousted then-dictator Lt. Gen. Henry Namphy.
   Avril pledged to hold elections, but never followed through. In March
1990, a popular uprising forced him into exile, and he moved to Boca Raton,
Fla.
   It's unclear when Avril returned to Haiti, but he reappeared at a
meeting of the opposition alliance Convergence last year.
   Police arrested him about a month later, on May 26, at a restaurant
while he was signing copies of his newly published Black Book of
Insecurity. His book blames President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's party for
tolerating street crime and political assassinations from 1995 to 2000.
Government officials deny such accusations.
   Human rights activists blame the former dictator for rights violations
during his rule. But human rights advocate Jean-Claude Bajeux said: "It is
unacceptable that a democracy plays as fast and loose with the law as a
dictatorship."