[Ppnews] Haiti: message from children of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine / action still needed via faxes and calls
Political Prisoner News
ppnews at freedomarchives.org
Thu Oct 11 20:15:56 EDT 2007
Below: Sign online petition for the safe return
of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine - missing for 2 months since August 12, 2007
A MESSAGE FROM THE CHILDREN OF DISAPPEARED
HAITIAN HUMAN RIGHTS LEADER LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE
Our names are Stéphane and Olivier
Pierre-Antoine, the children of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine.
This week will be the sixth one that we spend
without our father, who is kept hostage and it
has been more than 42 days since we did not
receive any notice from him being alive. The
hours and the days go by without anyone, except
his close relatives, seeming to worry about his fate.
We have felt a big void in our hearts since this
disappearance. This deplorable situation prevent
us from sleeping, eating and forces us to
concentrate our thoughts on the slow agony that
our father is living. Deprived of freedom, our
father incurs the risks to catch diseases, to be
victim of physical violence by his abductors and
to have his spirit devoured by despair.
We ask you, who probably are fathers and mothers,
to listen to the words of two teenagers who crave
the presence of their father. Listen well to
this outcry of pain and anguish that comes
directly from our heart. It is not only our
father that we miss, we are also deprived of our
dear friend, of our counselor and of our
spiritual guide. We ask the authorities of the
country and the Haitian people to do all this
that is in their power to free our dad. We
particularly ask his abductors to grant us the
return of our daddy who is so dear to us.
Even if we are aware that a release is a complex
and long process, it has been more than a month
than we did not see our dad and we want to insist
on the unbearable wait that we are confronted
with. In the name of Human Rights and of the
inherent duty to save people in lethal danger, we
massively call on the Haitian authorities and the
international community to help us find the means
that will allow the release of our dad.
We do not doubt that in the future, all efforts
will be set in motion to make the release of our
dear dad an absolute priority. We wish for
energetic and effective measures to be deployed
to this end. We take this opportunity to
cordially thank all those who, in a way or
another, brought us their moral support during this sad period of our life.
Stéphane Pierre-Antoine and Olivier Pierre-Antoine
Urgent help needed to ensure the safe return
of Haitian human rights activist
Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine
Dear Friends,
Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine, the internationally
respected Haitian human rights activist, has been
missing in Haiti since 12 August.
The following is a call for his safe return to
his family and to his human rights work, to be
sent to President Rene Preval of Haiti, as well
as to the Brazilian, Canadian & US High
Commissions /Embassies/Consulates in whatever
countries we find ourselves. These governments
play a key role in relation to the UN forces
(headed by Brazil) which have taken
responsibility for law and order in
Haiti. Background is given below. The link is
<
<http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html>http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html>
http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html .
Please add your name to let those to whom the
call is addressed know how urgent you believe is
Lovinsky's safe return. Thus far there are over
90 organizations, public figures and other
individuals who have signed from 16 Caribbean
countries as well as from other countries,
including: actor/activist Danny Glover, writer
George Lamming, journalist Rickey Singh; the
Walter Rodney Commemorative Committee (Caribbean,
USA, UK, Canada, Africa); Crossroads Women's
Centers (Guyana, Spain, UK, US); the Local
Station Board, KPFK, Pacifica Radio (So.
California). Names of all signatories are being
sent to those to whom the letter is addressed,
and will be published at a later date. Thank you.
Women of Color Global Women's
Strike Red Thread (Guyana)
TO: President Preval
The Brazilian Embassy
The US Embassy
The Canadian Embassy
RE: Urgent help in ensuring the safe return of
Haitian human rights activist Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine
As women and men in the Caribbean Region, in the
wider diaspora, and in many parts of the world,
we are writing to urge you to make resources
available without delay for the search for
Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine, and to do everything in
your power to secure his safe return to his family and community.
As you may know, Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine, the
internationally respected Haitian human rights
activist who is well loved by his family and
community, has been missing in Haiti since the
evening of August 12. We are acutely aware of
the suffering, hardship and heartbreak Lovinsky's
disappearance has meant for his family and other
loved ones, as well as of the anger and suffering
of the community from whose arms this gentle man
and leading advocate for the poor has been snatched.
Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine is a father, a husband,
an uncle, a member of an extended family; a
soft-spoken man of great compassion with a big
heart and a sense of humor. He is also an
extraordinary grassroots leader. Lovinsky, as
he is generally known, is a co-founder of
Fondayson Trant Septanm, an organization founded
by family members and others concerned about the
victims of the 1991 coup, the first against
President Aristide; the organization's name is
the date of that coup. Similar to the work of
internationally renowned Mothers of the
Disappeared in Central and South America, the
September 30th Foundation for over a decade held
weekly vigils demanding justice for victims of
human rights violations and the release of political prisoners.
Additionally, Lovinsky was the co-founder of
Fondsayon Kore Timoun Yo (Foundation for the
Support of Children) for young street children in
Port au Prince, FAM (Foyer pour Adolescentes
Mères), a center for teenage mothers, and Map Viv
("I Live"), a program designed to give medical
and psychological aid to the victims of the
1991coup. His present community-based human
rights organization Fondayson Trant Septnm grew
out of the work of those earlier efforts. He is
part of the Lavalas movement and a member of the
Lavalas Party, and was a potential candidate for the Haitian Senate.
Lovinsky lived in Washington DC during the
turmoil and violence that followed the removal of
President Aristide in 2004. During that time he
continued his work as an advocate for Haiti's
poverty-stricken majority, including gathering
support of a wide network of organizations and
individuals in the US, meeting with members of
Congress, speaking at human rights forums in
Boston, Los Angeles and elsewhere in the US as
well as in Brazil, Canada and Venezuela. A month
after he returned to Haiti, Lovinsky was
instrumental in bringing together a delegation
that included journalists and others who hail
from Guyana, Barbados and the United States to
attend the May 2006 Inauguration of President Rene Preval.
Those of us who were part of that delegation were
struck by the welcome Lovinsky received from
grassroots Haitians as they greeted him publicly
for the first time since his return. At a
community-based event to mark the inauguration of
President Preval, he was mobbed as a returning
hero, a man who was clearly respected, loved and
had been missed by the thousands who had gathered
hopeful for a new day in Haiti. The mutual
respect and love between him and other grassroots
women and men was also evident in a later meeting
with women from Cite Soleil most of whom were
either former political prisoners or the mothers,
wives and other relatives of political prisoners,
many carrying photographs of their tortured children and husbands.
As the first Black republic, Haiti has always
held a special place in the heart of those of us
in the Caribbean region and to oppressed peoples
throughout the world. Haiti led the way for the
emancipation of those of us enslaved; provided
refuge for Simon Bolivar, the liberator of Latin
America, and sent troops to fight alongside
Bolivar. The Haitian Revolution also opened the
way for the Louisiana Purchase in the United
States through its defeat of Napoleon's forces.
But instead of being celebrated for these
important achievements, the Haitian people have
paid a heavy price for winning emancipation, a
price which helps explain their present suffering
and their having still to struggle for human and
economic rights while doing the wrenching work of
day-to-day survival in what has been named the
poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
We all owe a great debt to the Haitian
people. Their spirited and principled
determination, their refusal to bend to the
powerful forces which have tried to keep them
down, has been and continues to be an inspiration
throughout the world but especially to those of
us who defend human rights and dignity in the
Caribbean region. Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine
personifies the Haitian determination which has
refused to submit despite all the odds. He has
refused careerism and opportunism and continues
to stand with the popular movement. He has
earned the solidarity of the whole of the wider
Caribbean Community and around the world who
struggle for justice and freedom in our region. A
man of Haiti, he is a part of us wherever we are
and wherever there is injustice around the world.
We urge the Embassies of the United States and
Brazil, as well as President of Haiti Rene
Preval, to do all in your power, including making
resources available to secure the safe return of
a true freedom fighter: Lovinsky
Pierre-Antoine. We ask that he be returned
unharmed to his family, and to the community that loves and needs him.
Andaiye, Guyana: Red Thread, Guyana and Women of
Color in the Global Women's Strike
Margaret Prescod, Barbados/ Los Angeles,
California: journalist and Women of Color in the Global Women's Strike
cc: CARICOM
For further info and/or to support the call
below, email us at
<<http://www.globalwomenstrike.net/>http://www.globalwomenstrike.net
>www.globalwomenstrike.net or sign on line:
Caribbean
region:
<mailto:red_thread at gol.net.gy><mailto:red_thread at gol.net.gy>
red_thread at gol.net.gy tel: 011 592 227 7010
US:
<mailto:la at crossroadswomen.net><mailto:la at crossroadswomen.net>
la at crossroadswomen.net tel: 323-276-9833
Europe: <mailto:
womenstrike8m at server101.com><mailto:womenstrike8m at server101.com>
womenstrike8m at server101.com tel: + 44 (0) 207 482 2496
On
line:
<http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html>http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html
We the undersigned are asking for the safe return of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine.
Name
Country
Organization or ID
<
http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html
><http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html>http://www.petitiononline.com/august/petition.html.
++++++++++++
Please continue to contact the following offices
of the Haitian government, the US embassy and the
UN occupying powers. Express your concern that
all efforts are being made to facilitate the safe
return of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine, missing in Haiti since August 12, 2007.
Haitian Ministry of Justice
Tel: 011-509-245-0474
UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH)
Tel: 011-509-244-0650/0660
FAX: 011-509-244-9366/67
Or, Fax Office of UN Secretary General in New York: 212-963-4879
United States Embassy in Haiti
Tel: 011-509-223-4711, or 222-0200 or 0354
FAX: 011-509-223-1641
Embassy of Brazil in Haiti
FAX: 011-509-256-0900
Email::<> <mailto:HAIBREM at accesshaiti.com>HAIBREM at accesshaiti.com
Tel: 011-509-256-9662 or 6208 or 7556 or 7578
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/ppnews_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20071011/31db1f74/attachment.htm>
More information about the PPnews
mailing list