28765: Hermantin(News)Jailed former Haitian prime minister speaks out (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Posted on Thu, Jul. 27, 2006



Jailed former Haitian prime minister speaks out

By NANCY SAN MARTIN
nsanmartin@MiamiHerald.com

PORT-AU-PRINCE - Former Prime Minister Yvon Neptune was freed Thursday 
afternoon, just hours after vowing that he remained as determined as ever to 
fight a ''machine of injustice'' that kept him jailed for two years without 
trial.

''The machine of injustice must stop reproducing itself,'' a barefoot Neptune 
had told a small group of reporters Wednesday in the barren bedroom that served 
as his cell. ``This is not something that concerns just me. It is something 
that concerns all the Haitian people who don't have the means to face the 
machine of injustice.''

Neptune's 20-minute talk with reporters came as human rights activists try to 
persuade him to end his on-and-off hunger strikes, even though they agree with 
his contention that his arrest was politically motivated. Neptune spoke barely 
above a whisper as he lay on a cushion set on the floor with his head propped 
up by three thin pillows.

''People understand the injustice they are doing to Neptune and other 
prisoners,'' said Ronald St. Jean, head of the Defense of Political Prisoners, 
a group that has collected about 1,500 signatures in Haiti and abroad appealing 
for a resolution in the case.

''Neptune also understands the significance of his message,'' St. Jean said. 
``We hope that he will give up his hunger strike and be set free.''

The 59-year-old Neptune, who served under President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was 
jailed in connection with a 2004 massacre of Aristide opponents near the 
western port city of St. Marc. He was among several prominent people jailed by 
the U.S.-backed interim government following a revolt that sent Aristide into 
exile in February 2004.

Neptune has been demanding his unconditional release and last year refused a 
deal that would have allowed him to go to the neighboring Dominican Republic. 
An appeal seeking that the charges be dropped was at a standstill since 
October.

''The appeals court has violated the right of the political prisoner,'' said 
Neptune's attorney Mario Joseph. ``As a political prisoner, he needs to fight 
for justice.''

Patrick Elie, a founding member of a citizens watchdog group that has joined 
the international campaign for Neptune's release, called the case 
''emblematic'' of Haiti's problems. The group claims that of an estimated 4,000 
prisoners in jail here, only 10 percent have been tried and that many of them 
were arrested simply for supporting Aristide.

''If we are able to spring Neptune loose, it will open doors for other 
prisoners arbitrarily arrested for political reasons,'' Elie said.

Neptune was being held in a two-story house next to the headquarters for the 
National Police that serves as a prison for high-profile inmates. The house, in 
the upscale neighborhood of Pacot, is surrounded by a tall steel fence topped 
with razor wire and is guarded by police and at least one soldier from the U.N. 
peacekeeping force deployed here.

Neptune's room, on the second floor, had no furniture, except for the cushion 
on the floor that served as a bed. He had a private bathroom and access to a 
balcony enclosed by bars that overlook the sprawling capital city and its 
seaport.

At his bedside were several plastic bottles of water, books on liberty and the 
Haitian constitution, a radio and a yellow legal pad with a few scribbled lines 
in his handwriting. Also nearby were an unlit candle and a small electric 
burner, a clock and his glasses.

Leaning against a wall a few steps away, were two pieces of cardboard with 
handwritten words in French and in Creole. One welcomed ''all who support truth 
and liberty'' and the other called for doing away with injustice.

Neptune said that soon after Aristide fled, unidentified authorities came to 
him with three options: exile, prison or death.

''Exile, they will never get me to leave; prison, I'm already here; and death, 
that can come any time,'' said Neptune, speaking in English and Creole. Asked 
if he blamed the U.S. government for his predicament, Neptune rolled his eyes 
and snickered.

''The dagger is here,'' he said, pointing to his stomach. ``You want me to give 
them the ability to twist it?''

''The truth is known now. It doesn't have to come from my mouth,'' Neptune 
added. ``I'm accused of being the mastermind and the accomplice for something 
that at first was a genocide and then a massacre and now I don't know if it's 
been reduced to a killing.

``And the supposed democratic government is now offering me the opportunity to 
run away. Does that make sense?''

During the interim government's tenure, Neptune said he received many visits 
from foreign diplomats, including some from the United States. But those visits 
have stopped.

''In quite some time, I don't see them anymore,'' he said. ``I guess they don't 
like my line of thought and they don't like to hear the truth.''