29126: (news) Chamberlain: The Guardian on Lancet report (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

(The Guardian, 8 Sept 06)


Lancet caught up in row over Haiti murders

· Report appeared to clear Aristide camp of blame
· Magazine investigates 'misleading' study

By Duncan Campbell


The Lancet medical journal is investigating complaints that it published a
misleading account of violence in
Haiti that appears to exonerate the supporters of the exiled leader
Jean-Bertrand Aristide of murder, sexual
assaults and kidnapping.

The report into human rights abuses, carried out by Wayne State University
in Michigan, found that 8,000
people had been murdered and 35,000 women sexually assaulted in
Port-au-Prince in the 22 months after Mr
Aristide was ousted in 2004. But it found that while opponents of Mr
Aristide's Lavalas Family party were
responsible for 13% of the murders, 11% of the sexual assaults and 17% of
kidnappings, supporters of Lavalas
were not implicated in any of them.

Charles Arthur, an author and Haitian solidarity activist in Europe, has
written to the editor of the Lancet
challenging the the notion that no Lavalas groups were involved in the
violence. He said there had been many
allegations that all groups, including Lavalas, had been involved.

Mr Arthur also said that one of the authors of the report, Athena Kolbe,
had previously written favourably
about Mr Aristide when working as a journalist in Haiti under the name of
Lyn Duff. The Lancet report quotes
articles by Ms Duff without saying that she is the same person as Ms Kolbe.

The report identified criminals as the main perpetrators of the violence,
but the Haitian police and opponents
of Mr Aristide were also cited as being responsible for much of it. UN
soldiers were implicated in lesser
crimes.

A women's rights group in Haiti has also protested to the Lancet that the
findings run counter to all the
evidence they have received from rape victims. "We have seen around 1,000
cases of rape," said Anne Sosin, of
Haiti Rights Vision. "What our evidence overwhelmingly suggests is that all
groups are implicated in abuse
against women. It's important that scientific journals such as the Lancet
are used to hold all perpetrators to
account for human rights violations and abuses."

Ms Kolbe said this week that she stood by the findings. "I am not a
supporter of Lavalas," she said. She added
that the report indicated that Lavalas Family party supporters had been
involved in assaults, death threats
and other offences, although not in murder and rape.

The report does indeed state that "political groups on both sides of the
spectrum were named as responsible
for violent and criminal acts ... Lavalas members and partisans of the
Lavalas movement were also named as
having committed such acts."

Ms Kolbe said she felt that the most important aspect of the research -
that there had been widespread murder
and rape in Port-au-Prince - should not be lost in issues over people's
past work.

Her colleague, Professor Royce Hutson, also stood behind the report's
findings. He said that, with hindsight,
clarifying that Ms Kolbe and one of her sources were the same person might
have been advisable. He said they
were fully cooperating with the Lancet inquiry but were confident there
were no issues of conflict of
interest.

The UN stabilisation mission in Haiti (Minustah) has also queried the
report's findings and suggests that the
estimate of 8,000 murders is four times higher than its own data from human
rights organisations on the
island.

Speaking for Minustah, Sophie Boutaud de la Combe said the report's
conclusions "seem exaggerated" and she
felt a truer figure would be 2,000.

The publisher of the Lancet, Richard Horton, said the study had come with
excellent credentials and peer
reviews. "It was very thoroughly reviewed by four external advisers," he
said.

He added that if a journalist quoted in the report was the same person as
the academic conducting the research
he would have expected it to be disclosed and was "dismayed" that it had
not been. The Lancet is checking that
all the correct procedures for the research were followed.

It is not suggested that the Lancet report had misreported its findings or
that Ms Kolbe had any other agenda
than the welfare of ordinary Haitians at heart. It is accepted by all
parties that the study's core findings -
that there have been disturbingly high levels of violence and sexual abuse
in Haiti in that period - are true
and need to be urgently addressed by the Haitian government and other
bodies.

The president of Haiti, René Préval, a former close ally of Mr Aristide,
was elected earlier this year. Mr
Aristide, from whose party Mr Préval distanced himself in the election
campaign, is in exile in South Africa.