15091: Nadal: Haiti :human rights violations (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

  From  Olivier Nadal ;  o_nadal@bellsouth.net


March 6, 2003

HAITI: U.N. Expert Says Rights Declining, Urges U.N. Presence
Louis Joinet, a U.N. independent expert on human rights in Haiti, said
yesterday that human rights abuses against journalists, political activists
and rights advocates in the country occur frequently and often go
unpunished.

In a report slated for submission to the U.N. Human Rights Commission, which
begins its next session March 17, Joinet proposed that the commission open
an office in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.

Joinet said that the climate created by rights violations "not only
oppresses people but also dissuades international and domestic companies
from investing" in Haiti, that journalists "could tomorrow have no other
choice than between auto-censorship, exile or death," that a resurgence in
discrimination-related abuses is taking place and that there has been a
sharp upswing in everyday violence (Agence France-Presse, March 5).










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