23447: (Hermantin)Miami-Herald-Activist priest jailed in a nervous Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Posted on Thu, Oct. 14, 2004




VIOLENCE IN HAITI


Activist priest jailed in a nervous Haiti

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES

jcharles@herald.com


The Rev. Gerard Jean-Juste, who personified the struggles of South Florida's
Haitian refugees before leading the fight to get former Roman Catholic
priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide elected as Haiti's president, was arrested
Wednesday in Port-au-Prince.

Jean-Juste, reached at the jail in the Port-au-Prince suburb of Petionville,
said he understood the charge against him to be inciting ``public trouble.''

''I am in jail now,'' the charismatic activist told The Herald in a
telephone interview. ``I was feeding the children in my church, in a public
cafeteria like I do twice a week. They came in to arrest me. Then handcuffed
me.''

Jean-Juste's arrest comes as Aristide supporters plan a major demonstration
in the capital on Friday to mark the 10th anniversary of his return from his
first exile in the United States.

At the same time, The Associated Press reported that former soldiers who
ousted Aristide in February were expecting to launch their own campaign to
end the violence that has killed at least 48 people in the last several
weeks.

The soldiers, led by Remissainthe Ravix, a former army major, blame Lavalas
for much of the recent violence.

Gerard Latortue, Haiti's interim prime minister, said a warrant was issued
for Jean-Juste's arrest after Haitian authorities received intelligence that
the priest's name had been associated with suspected leaders of Lavalas --
Aristide's family party -- who have been organizing against the interim
government since Sept. 30.

''Rightly or wrongly, the name of Jean-Juste was associated with those who
[were] planning, organizing and implementing those things,'' Latortue said.
``Many priests are involved in that. Most of the terrorists are meeting in
churches.''

Jean-Juste is the latest in a string of Lavalas leaders to be arrested as
violence has intensified in Haiti.

Within hours of the arrest, an estimated 200 Jean-Juste supporters protested
in Miami's Little Haiti, where the priest served as director of Haitian
Refugee Center before he resigned in 1991 to return to Haiti to work for
Aristide.

Haitian-American activist Marleine Bastien called the arrest outrageous.

''The people should not settle for this,'' she said from Little Haiti, where
she was protesting outside Veye Yo, the pro-Aristide grass-roots
organization that Jean-Juste founded. ``For this government to go and arrest
him like that, they have no respect.''

Jean-Claude Bajeux, a human-rights activist in Haiti and opponent of
Aristide, said Jean-Juste ``is accused of protecting the people with
weapons.''

Latortue said Jean-Juste was part of a mounting campaign by Aristide and
Lavalas to have Aristide return to power just as he did on Oct. 15, 1994,
the day the Clinton administration returned him to the presidency following
the U.S. invasion of Haiti.

''They want to cut off my head and kill two or three ministers on the
15th,'' Latortue said. ``That is what they are saying. They see Jean-Juste
as their leader. A battle is being fought on behalf of Aristide against the
government.''

That battle, Latortue said, is being orchestrated by Aristide, in exile in
South Africa.

''There is violence everyday,'' said Latortue, who said his government
believes it is being financed from the United States. ``This afternoon we
arrested a Canadian at the airport and found more than $1 million in his
suitcase.''

Latortue said Lavalas supporters believe that if they can create violence
and chaos in Haiti, they will succeed at embarrassing the Bush
administration -- Aristide claims that he was ''kidnapped'' by the United
States, a charge the U.S. government vehemently denies -- and help John
Kerry become president.

They believe if Kerry wins, ''he will do just like Clinton and have
[Aristide] return,'' Latortue said.

South Florida attorney Ira Kurzban, who worked alongside Jean-Juste
championing the legal rights of Haitians seeking refuge in the United States
and who represents Aristide, disputed Latortue's claims.

''People who know Jean-Juste for 25 years as a community activist, as
someone who has supported peaceful resistance to Duvalier and other
nondemocratic governments in Haiti, know these charges are patently false
and are designed simply to stifle dissent,'' Kurzban said.

Kernst Jean-Juste, the priest's brother and a Miami resident, said he
received a call from his brother about a half hour before the arrest. His
brother said he was being followed by a caravan of armed men.

At one point, Jean-Juste said he had been blocked by one of the vehicles but
then detoured.

He was arrested while feeding about 600 children and 150 adults.

Jonas Petit, the national spokesman for Lavalas, said armed gangs -- and not
Aristide supporters -- are responsible for the violence in Haiti.

''They are the ones who have the power and have official power to do this,''
said Petit, who is in Broward County. 'Latortue baptized them as `freedom
fighters' and is now putting them on the backs of the Haitian people.''

Herald staff writers Susannah Nesmith and Jim DeFede contributed to this
report.

_________________________________________________________________
Don’t just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search!
http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/