[News] Haiti's Jean-Juste & Ste. Claire's Under Attack CALLS NEEDED

[News at freedomarchives.org]

Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti
P.O. Box 745, Joseph, OR 97846
(541) 432-0597, www.ijdh.org, info at ijdh.org

Urgent Haiti Human Rights Alert:
Attacks Against Rev. Gerard Jean-Juste on March 24 and 25, 2005

Each of the last two nights has seen attacks against Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste 
or his church, Sainte Claire's Catholic Church, located in a poor 
neighborhood of Delmas, Haiti.  Fr. Jean-Juste is a prominent activist for 
peace and justice in Haiti, and spent seven weeks as a political prisoner 
in October and November 2004.  Despite his high profile and the history of 
politically-motivated attacks against him, the United Nations Stabilization 
Mission to Haiti (MINUSTAH) declined to respond to his call for help after 
Friday's attack.  We urge you to contact MINUSTAH today to insist that the 
Mission provide protection for Fr. Jean-Juste, especially at this evening's 
Easter Vigil mass at Ste. Claire's.

Late at night on Thursday, March 24, Fr. Jean-Juste surprised an intruder 
by the back door of the Ste. Claire rectory.  The man fled, but later that 
night neighbors caught a man they believe to be the intruder, and handed 
him over to the police.  On Friday evening, March 25, men dressed in black 
in one or more pickup trucks arrived outside Ste. Claire's and started 
shooting wildly, reportedly with automatic weapons.  People contacted 
MINUSTAH on Fr. Jean-Juste's behalf, and were told by top officials that 
MINUSTAH would send people right away.  As of late morning on Saturday, 
MINUSTAH police had not arrived, although Fr. Jean-Juste reports a MINUSTAH 
helicopter did fly over his church in the morning.

Late tonight Ste. Claire's will hold an Easter Vigil mass.  The church will 
be filled with parishioners, most from the poor neighborhoods that have 
been targeted for political violence over the last year.  There may be no 
electricity outside, and there will be few people out besides the 
churchgoers.  Gunmen attacked Haitian Catholic churches filled with 
pro-democracy activists in 1987 (the St. Jean Bosco Massacre) and 1993 (the 
Antoine Izmery Assassination).  We must not let this happen again.

Please contact MINUSTAH immediately to insist that the Mission assure the 
security of  Fr. Jean-Juste and Ste. Claire's church, especially at this 
evening's Easter Vigil mass.   Your call or email does not need to be 
complicated, just communicate that: 1) you care about Fr. Jean-Juste, and 
2) MINUSTAH should protect him.  Calling is best because of the urgency, 
but if you are unable to get through (it may take a few tries, calls to 
Haiti are difficult today), please send an email or fax.   More background 
information on Fr. Jean-Juste and MINUSTAH is below.

Contact Information

Lt. General Augusto Heleno Ribeiro Pereira, UN Military Commander in Haiti: 
011-509-554-8074, pereira17 at un.org.

Damian Onses-Cardona, Spokesperson for Gen. Pereira:  011-509-527-5118 
(cell), 011-509-510-2563, ext. 6303.

Touissant Congo-Doudou, Head of Communications, MINUSTAH: 011-509-557-5906, 
kongo-doudou at un.org.

David Beer, Commissioner of CIVPOL, the UN Civilian Police in Haiti: 
011-509-525-5279
beer at un.org, fax: 011-509-244-9366.

Juan Gabriel Valdes, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General to 
Haiti: 011-509-244-9650 or  9660, fax 011-509 244 3512.


Background Information

Fr. Jean-Juste

On Wednesday, October 13, 2004, Haitian police forcibly entered Ste. 
Claire's church and arrested Fr. Jean-Juste, without a warrant, while he 
was feeding the hungry children of his parish.  The men were heavily-armed 
men, some wore Haitian National Police (HNP) uniforms, some did not, and 
many wore masks.  The police dragged Fr. Jean-Juste out  though a window of 
the rectory, cutting his leg on broken glass.  Fr. Jean-Juste spent almost 
a month in jail before seeing a judge.  Gérard Latortue, Haiti's interim 
Prime Minister, and Justice Minister Bernard Gousse claimed that Fr. 
Jean-Juste was linked to terrorist activities,  and prosecutors alleged he 
was connected to two murders, but no one produced a single piece of 
evidence linking Fr. Jean-Juste to any illegal activity.  The judge ordered 
Fr. Jean-Juste released for lack of evidence, but the government waited 
seventeen days to execute the order, then retaliated against the judge by 
illegally taking all of his cases away from him.

Fr. Jean-Juste speaks out forcefully against all forms of violence, from 
the pulpit and on his radio shows.  He spoke out against the 
state-sponsored violence of the Duvalier regime, the de facto dictatorship 
(1991-1994) and the Haitian army.  He also speaks out against violence by 
the victims of that violence and by supporters of Haiti's Constitutional 
governments.  When opposition politicians were attacked following the April 
2000 funeral of assassinated journalist Jean-Dominique, Fr. Jean-Juste 
spent his entire two-hour radio show imploring everyone to return to their 
homes.

Fr. Jean-Juste has been highly effective at fighting political and economic 
violence through peaceful means.  When he was forced into exile for 
criticizing the Duvalier dictatorship, Fr. Jean-Juste retaliated with a 
lawsuit, winning a judgment against Jean-Claude Duvalier in Miami Federal 
Court.  In 1979, he co-founded the Haitian Refugee Center in Florida, which 
provided assistance to thousands of refugees from the Duvalier regime, and 
fought unjust immigration policies all the way to the U.S. Supreme 
Court.  In Haiti, Fr. Jean-Juste encouraged victims of the de 
facto  dictatorship to organize and to force Haitian courts to deliver 
justice.  On August 16, 2004, Haiti's interim government held a re-trial in 
the case of slain pro-democracy activist Antoine Izmery.  Although he knew 
the prosecution was not serious (the Washington Post called it "Sham 
Justice in Haiti"), and feared arrest, Fr. Jean-Juste bravely appeared, the 
only summoned witness to do so.


MINUSTAH

The UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) is a Peace-Keeping mission 
authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 1542, which mandates the 
mission to: "to protect civilians under imminent threat of physical 
violence….." (Article 7(I)(f), available at 
http://www.ijdh.org/UNRes1542.pdf?OpenElement).   MINUSTAH has more 
actively enforced this part of its mandate since February 28, when Haitian 
Police fired on a peaceful demonstration while MINUSTAH troops looked 
on.  But human rights groups report that over the long term "MINUSTAH has 
provided cover for abuses committed by the HNP during operations in poor, 
historically tense Port-au-Prince neighborhoods, "(Keeping the Peace in 
Haiti?, Centro de Justicia Global and Harvard Law Student Advocates for 
Human Rights, http://www.ijdh.org/#unhaiti, p. 38), and consistently fails 
to protect ordinary citizens from political violence ("the failure to do so 
when civilians beg for UN assistance is simply incomprehensible", Id. p.29).

MINUSTAH's failure to provide protection for Fr. Jean-Juste is particularly 
egregious in the context of recent attacks against the pro-democracy 
movement.  After the February 28 shootings, MINUSTAH promised to provide 
better protection, and for a few weeks it did.  But on Thursday morning, 
another peaceful, pre-announced demonstration was met with gunfire, killing 
three people.

For more information about Fr. Jean-Juste, MINUSTAH, and human rights in 
Haiti in general, consult www.ijdh.org.


Brian Concannon Jr.
Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti
541-432-0597
541-263-0029 (cell)
www.ijdh.org

The Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
(415) 863-9977
www.freedomarchives.org 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20050327/032a6de4/attachment.htm>