Haiti

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti's most prominent political party said yesterday it will try again to run candidates in upcoming legislative elections after being banned in the two most recent votes.
Maryse Narcisse, a spokeswoman for the political party of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, said in an interview on the privately run station Radio Kiskeya that the Lavalas Family party plans to run in the still-unscheduled vote.

GEORGETOWN, Guyana – Haiti’s President and CARICOM Chairman Michel Martelly says his country is open for business.
His declaration came on Thursday at a news briefing at the CARICOM Secretariat at Lilliendaal, East Coast Demerara.
Martelly said they were looking to bring jobs into the country for their people as the country worked to recover from its economic turmoil.

GEORGETOWN, Guyana – When high-level teams from the Caribbean Community and the United Nations Security Council visited Haiti in February last year to assess the post 2010 earthquake reconstruction efforts, one of the unanticipated issues that had to be taken account of was an outbreak of cholera which has resulted up to now in a total of about 8000 persons dead and over 600,000 suffering from the illness. The result has been a problem of dual priorities of almost equal importance to be faced by the UN itself, by Haiti, and by the wider Caribbean Community.

The island Haiti’s tourism leaders describe as the Caribbean’s ‘last true treasure island’ will be put under the development knife, as it undergoes an eco-makeover to become the region’s next biggest tourism hot spot. The region’s Ministry of Tourism has proposed a laid back development for the 52-square-kilometre island, Ile a Vache, that will highlight its cultural heritage areas, agro-tourism and history as well as 20 deserted beaches, Caribbean Journal reported. “Ile a Vache is one of the last true treasure islands of the Caribbean,” the Ministry of Tourism said in its proposal.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Testimony in the high-profile case of former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier resumed Thursday, with another alleged victim describing abuses she says were committed under his rule. Dr. Nicole Magloire told an appellate court about the broad influence wielded by the former leader known as "Baby Doc," and the alleged violations associated with his 15-year government. Duvalier "was declared supreme leader of all the armed forces in the country," said Magloire, an opposition leader who fled into exile during that era. "He was in charge of the National Palace.

WASHINGTON, CMC – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is providing Haiti with US$7.4 million after completing a review of the country’s performance under the Extended Credit Facility (ECF) earlier this month. The IMF said that the disbursement brings the total disbursements under the programme to date to US$54.1 million.

Haiti needs to develop a coordinated plan of action on human rights and a framework on the rule of law, an independent United Nations expert has said, noting that while positive changes are coming very slowly, there is a strong expectation from Haitians to see improvements.
“There is a need to have a strategy, there is a need also for each of the ministers to understand that they have a piece of the puzzle of the rule of law,” Michel Forst, Independent Expert on the situation of human rights in Haiti, told UN Radio yesterday.

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados — Former Jamaican Prime Minister P J Patterson has blasted the decision by the United Nations to invoke "legal immunity" for rejecting compensation claims by some 5,000 Haitian victims of cholera.
"It is simply appalling, a most reprehensible behaviour... for the UN to claim such immunity," Patterson told the Jamaica Observer in a telephone interview.
"The moreso when scientific evidence substantates that the cholera epidemic was originally introduced in Haiti at the time by peace-keeping soldiers (from Nepal) under UN command," Patterson continued.

PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti, CMC – The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders (MSF) says a lack of funds and supplies has crippled cholera treatment programmes in Haiti, leading to unnecessary deaths and increasing the risk of greater outbreaks during the upcoming rainy season.
In recent evaluations of public health facilities in four Haitian departments—Artibonite, Nippes, Southeast, and North—MSF said it found that the quality of cholera treatment declined significantly in the last year due to funding shortfalls.

PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti, CMC - A senior United Nations humanitarian official is expressing grave concern about recent incidents of forced evictions of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Haiti. Acting UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Haiti, Ross Mountain, made the comment following a visit to a site from which thousands of people were forced to leave. While recognizing the right of owners to enjoy their property, Mountain recalled that the practice of forced eviction often results in violations of human rights such as the right to life and security of the individual.