As of November 19, 2004

Since the beginning of September the situation in Haiti has been steadily deteriorating, marked by both environmental disaster and armed conflict. The floods in northwest Haiti caused by Tropical Storm Jeanne claimed over 2,000 lives, with an additional 200,000 left homeless. In Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital, a climate of escalating political violence, has resulted in at least 170 people killed in gunfire, including 26 police officers, and 241 wounded by gunshots.

The scope of the damage in flood-ravaged parts of Haiti has been catastrophic, displacing the majority of residents in Haiti’s third largest city, Gonaives, and leaving them without a functioning infrastructure, homes, food or water. Road conditions, attacks on humanitarian vehicles by armed gangs, and political violence have regularly disrupted emergency food distributions there, depriving thousands of basic supplies.

Meanwhile, as many as 2,000 ex-soldiers, who earlier this year helped lead an armed revolt against former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, have retained control of many provincial towns, acting as de facto police officers and judges, where they brandish weapons, conduct patrols and claim to provide public security.

Initially, the interim government hailed these ex-soldiers as "freedom fighters." It also lent a sympathetic ear to their demands for a new Haitian army and 10 years of back pay, since Aristide had disbanded the army in 1995 after it deposed him in a coup d’etat in 1991. The government also responded by incorporating several hundred of these former soldiers into the ranks of the national police force, after allegedly vetting them for human rights abusers and drug traffickers.

However, the relationship between the interim government and the former soldiers started to become strained when the ex-soldiers took it upon themselves in September to enter Port-au-Prince to quell an increasingly violent campaign by pro-Aristide partisans demanding his return from exile. The violence has sporadically closed streets, schools and businesses, with armed gangs of men and boys roaming neighborhoods and setting up barricades of burning tires and cars.

Additionally, journalists and human rights workers have received threats and have been the targets of intimidation and violence from both sides of the conflict, including the shooting death by unknown gunmen on September 13, 2004 of a popular evangelical pastor, Rev. Moleste Lovinsky Bertomieux, who was the host of a daily radio program.

In early October two police officers were shot to death and then decapitated in what has been described by some as "Operation Baghdad." Interim President Boniface Alexandre has been quoted as calling pro-Aristide gangs as "terrorists and they should be treated as such." Since then the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) and members of the Haitian National Police have conducted offensive operations to stop the violent clashes between supporters and opponents of Aristide, with many of the raids carried out in slum areas such as Bel-Air, Cite Soleil, and Fort National, and a number of innocent people getting killed in the crossfire.

After one such raid, Fort National residents accused the police of killing 13 people, which the U.N. special envoy for Haiti has urged the government to investigate. Haitian government officials have denied that the police carried out such an operation in Fort National, blaming armed gangs for recent killings.

Overall, Haiti’s interim government has used strong arm measures, including arbitrary arrests and detentions to respond to spiraling violence. Expressing grave concern for the current situation, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has called on the interim government of Haiti, "in collaboration with the international community, to take the urgent steps necessary to guarantee the security of its population by disarming illegally armed groups and to investigate, prosecute and punish those responsible for killings and other atrocities, regardless of who may be responsible." Amnesty International has called on Haiti’s interim government "to investigate allegations of police brutality, including claims of summary executions."

Send a letter now to President George W. Bush demanding Justice for Dantica and Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitians!

For more information, please see:

NCHR Statements on Dantica and TPS:

• New York, November 19, 2004 -- Reverend Joseph Dantica Did Not Have to Die in Immigration Detention. It’s Time to End Policies That Single Out Haitians for Mean Treatment.

• New York, November 19, 2004 -- Backgrounder on Human Rights Conditions in Haiti.

• New York. November 17, 2004 -- Haitian Asylum-Seeker Dies in Immigration Custody. Haitian Rights Coalition Calls for Full Investigation.

Timeline: Events Preceding Dantica's Tragic Death Events Preceding The Death of the Rev. Joseph N. Dantica

Other Statements:

• Human Rights First: Baptist Minister Dies in US Immigration Jail

• Amnesty International: Urge Investigation into the Death of rev. Joseph Dantica

• Church World Service: Detention and Death of 81-year old Pastor Appalling

Dantica and TPS in the Media:

• NY Daily News, Nov. 28, 2004 -- A Death Bares America's Biased Policy

• Associated  Press, Nov. 27, 2004 -- Death of Man, 81, in US Custody, Another Haitian Tragedy.

• New York Times, Nov. 24, 2004 -- A Very Haitian Story, by Edwidge Danticat.

• New York Newsday, Nov. 21, 2004 -- Rev. Dantica, Haitian Who Died in Fed Custody.

• New York Post, Nov. 21, 2004 -- Tears, Rage Over Haitian Refugee Who Died in Fed Jail.

• New York Times, Nov. 21, 2004 -- New York Was Our City on the Hill, by Edwidge Danticat

• The Guardian, Nov. 20, 2004 -- Preacher's Death Prompts Protest.

• Associated Press, Nov. 19, 2004 -- Family, Activists Seek Answers in Death of Haitian Minister

• New York Daily News, Nov. 19, 2004 -- Fury Over Haitian Author's Kin.

• St. Petersburg Times, Nov. 19, 2004 -- Haitian Pastor Dies on US Doorstep.

• South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Nov. 17, 2004 -- Human Rights Groups Urge Probe Into Death of Haitian in US Custody.

• Associated Press, Nov. 17, 2004 -- Probe Sought in Haitian Detainee's Death.

• Miami Herald, Nov. 17, 2004 -- Probe Requested in Death of Haitian Man in Federal Custody

• Miami Herald, Nov. 14, 2004 -- Twice a Victim, First in Haiti then the US

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