26 January 2005
JOURNALIST KILLED AS VIOLENCE FLARES
The Inter American Press Association (IAPA) is calling on Haitian authorities to investigate the murder of radio journalist Abdias Jean, who was reportedly killed by police during a raid on a shantytown near Port-au-Prince.
On 14 January 2005, police raided Village de Dieu, considered a stronghold for supporters of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and killed several people, according to a Reuters correspondent. Witnesses said heavily armed policemen pressured three youths to reveal the whereabouts of alleged armed bandits. When the youths said they did not know, they were accused of "hiding criminals" and killed. Shortly after, Jean, who may have witnessed the killing, was also killed. He was a correspondent for the Miami radio station WKAT-AM.
In recent months, violence has flared amid clashes between pro- and anti-Aristide groups. Aristide supporters are demanding the former president's return to Haiti after he was deposed in February 2004 following US pressure to step down. Aristide is currently living in South Africa.
According to the International Crisis Group, at least 80 people have been killed since September, many of them in shantytowns where armed groups have clashed with the Haitian National Police. Police have been accused of executing young men in the Aristide strongholds.
The violence has affected other journalists, including two reporters from the daily newspaper "Le Nouveilliste", say IAPA and Reporters Without Borders (Reporters sans frontières, RSF).
On 14 January, Aristide supporters attacked Claude Bernard Serant and Jonel Juste while the journalists were covering a UN peacekeeping manoeuvre in Bel-Air. They were badly beaten and their equipment was stolen.
Meanwhile, the president of the Haitian Journalists' Association, Joseph Guyler Delva, who is a correspondent for Reuters, has received death threats.
IAPA says it plans to hold an Emergency Forum in Port-au-Prince on 3 February to call attention to attacks on journalists and the problem of impunity in Haiti.
Visit:
- IAPA: http://www.sipiapa.org/pressreleases/chronologicaldetail.cfm?PressReleaseID=1294
- RSF: http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=12324
- RSF Report on Haiti: http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=10889
- Committee to Protect Journalists' Report: http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2004/haiti_7_04/haiti_7_04.html
- International Crisis Group Report: http://www.icg.org/home/index.cfm?id=3109&l=1
- Reuters: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N1J407474.htm
- Democracy Now: http://www.democracynow.org/static/haiti.shtml
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