22725: Fenton: Haiti: Former Prime Minister Yvon Neptune appears in court in broken legs case (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Anthony Fenton <apfenton@ualberta.ca>

17 July 2004
08:13 am
BBC Monitoring Americas
English
(c) 2004 The British Broadcasting Corporation [date of publication]. All
Rights Reserved. No material may be reproduced except with the express
permission of The British Broadcasting Corporation.

Text of report by Haitian Metropole radio on 16 July; passages within
double oblique strokes in Creole

Former Lavalas Prime Minister Yvon Neptune, who has been in jail since
27 June after he gave himself up to the Haitian National Police, appeared
in court today amid strong police security and accompanied by his
lawyers.

Examining Judge Fredi Fabien questioned Neptune for about 20 minutes.
The former prime minister was questioned about the bloody events that
took place in the School of Social Sciences on 5 December 2003. At that
time many students were brutally attacked by members of Lavalas
People's Organizations [OPs]. During that incident, the Lavalas
scoundrels broke both legs of the dean of the State University,
Pierre-Marie Paquiot. Paquiot was in court recently to testify in the case.

This afternoon, some partisans of former President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide, including former Deputy Gilvert Angervil, were present in front of
the court to offer support to Neptune when he arrived there. Former Deputy
Angervil said: //They arrested Prime Minister Yvon Neptune under the
pretext that he took part in the La Syrie [La Scierie] massacre, a case
which was invented by the National Coalition for Haitian Rights [NCHR].
They do not have a case and cannot bring him to justice. So now they are
only causing a diversion.//

One of Neptune's lawyers, Attorney Ephesien Joachim said: The court has
summoned him to appear for questioning about the Paquiot case.

The hearing took place without incidents.

Source: Radio Metropole, Port-au-Prince, in French 2300 gmt 16 Jul 04