Hungering for justice (Baltimore Sun re: Yvon Neptune)

<snip> Mr. Neptune has been held without trial in a Haitian prison since June 2004. He is refusing food to protest his detention for allegedly ordering the massacre of 50 opponents of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, whose government Mr. Neptune served. The accusations are widely believed to be politically motivated. Mr. Neptune insists he is innocent, and the reluctance of the U.S.-backed interim Haitian government to try him in court and provide evidence of his involvement in the murders supports his claim. Unlike other former government officials who fled the country after Mr. Aristide's March 2004 ouster, Mr. Neptune turned himself in last year when a warrant was issued for his arrest. Three months ago, when gunmen stormed the national penitentiary where he was being held, 500 inmates, including Mr. Neptune, were freed in the ensuing chaos. He promptly turned himself in to authorities again.

The Haitian government has offered to let Mr. Neptune leave the country, but he refuses to go unless the allegations against him are officially withdrawn or he is given his day in court. His imprisonment, along with that of about 1,000 others held without trial or formal charges, many of them Aristide supporters, is emblematic of a corrupt and politicized justice system. This selective adherence to judicial processes may explain the recent decision by the Haitian Supreme Court to overturn the convictions of 38 army and paramilitary leaders in the 1994 killings of more than a dozen Aristide supporters. Among the convictions overturned where those of Louis-Jodel Chamblain, a death squad leader who helped lead the rebellion that toppled Mr. Aristide.

Haiti appears no closer to political reconciliation today than in the early days after Mr. Aristide's fall, when the streets were literally on fire. Deadly clashes between disparate political factions remain as predictable as the hot weather. More than 500 people have been killed in the past eight months. Chances for successful presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for the fall are tenuous. And on Thursday, the U.S. State Department ordered nonessential embassy personnel out of the country after gunmen fired several shots at an embassy van traveling in the Haitian capital. U.S. citizens were also urged to leave because of security risks.

If the Bush administration is serious about supporting democracy around the world, where better than in Haiti, which is in our geographic back yard? It's not just Mr. Neptune's health that is in peril, it's also Haiti's.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/bal-ed.haiti29may29,1,2936599.story?coll=bal-opinion-headlines