2009

JULY
1 July - Canceling Haiti's debts will free up about $50 million a year for spending over the next 10 to 15 years to reduce poverty in the Caribbean nation, an IMF official said on Wednesday. The country won $1.2. billion in debt relief from the World Bank, IMF and other creditors earlier on Wednesday under a program by rich nations to ease the debt burdens of the world's poorest countries.

"It is a very important milestone for Haiti," Corinne Delechat, IMF mission chief for Haiti, told Reuters. "It is a recognition of the reform efforts the government has made since 2004 and 2005 when there was some return to political stability and democracy," she said. Delechat said the government's program to stabilize the fragile economy has reduced inflation, brought the budget deficit under control, improved management of public finances and increased reserves in Haiti. Finance Minister Daniel Dorsainvil hailed the debt relief as "good news" for the Caribbean nation, where most people live on less than $2 a day. (Reuters)

Debt cancellation - only mixed feelings - Haiti Support Group press release - 2 July 2009

JUNE
29 June - Haitian police say a demonstrator found slain after a clash with UN peacekeepers during a funeral procession was killed by a bullet, and not by a rock as peacekeepers initially reported. But the police inspector who shared details of the autopsy report on Monday said ballistics tests are needed to determine who fired the fatal shot. The inspector who viewed the autopsy report spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the autopsy. He did not offer any additional details. Opponents of the 9,000-member UN force are using the death to inflame passions against international troops stationed in Haiti since 2004.

The demonstrator, who remains unidentified, was killed June 18 as about 2,000 people marched with the casket of the Rev. Gerard Jean-Juste, an advocate for the poor who died in May after years of health problems. He was closely allied with ousted former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

At least five Brazilian soldiers with the 9,000-member UN peacekeeping mission entered the back of the procession near Port-au-Prince's Notre Dame cathedral on foot to arrest a marcher, who was later released. Other demonstrators threw rocks at the soldiers, who responded by firing at least eight shots into the air before leaving in a jeep.

UN peacekeeping spokeswoman Sophie Boutaud de la Combe said Monday that the Brazilian soldiers had some weapons loaded with rubber bullets and others with 7.62-milimeter caliber live ammunition. In television footage of the clash at least eight shots can be heard. It is not clear if all were fired by the soldiers. No one else is seen holding a firearm. (AP)

22 June - Haitians fed up with chronic poverty and unresponsive leaders stayed away from Senate run-off elections Sunday, ignoring government efforts to improve on the paltry voter turnout that undercut the first round of voting in April. Results are not expected for at least a week in contests for 11 vacant seats in the 30-member Senate. On the line is President Rene Preval's hope of overpowering uncooperative legislators and pushing through internationally backed economic reforms and constitutional amendments that would give his successors more power. Voting was extremely light in the capital of Port-au-Prince, though it was too soon to gauge the turnout in the rest of the country.

Another round of mostly empty ballot boxes could embarrass the government and fuel opponents' claims that it has stumbled in developing Haiti as a democracy. The first round of voting April 19, held after more than a year and half of delays, saw only 11 percent of registered voters participate. Electoral council president Frantz Gerard Verret took to the radio waves Sunday afternoon to plead with voters: "If you don't come out and vote, other people will vote for you." But as polls closed at 4 p.m. (5 p.m. EDT, 2100 GMT) those pleas appeared to have gone unheeded. Voting centers in the capital stood nearly deserted, with transparent ballot boxes holding just the folded paper ballots of poll workers themselves.

Early reports from the countryside were similar, with Haitian radio highlighting stories such as ballots arriving late to centers where no voters waited. Two polling places were reported shut down near the southern town of Jacmel. In at least one of those cases, supporters of a candidate ran in and tried to stuff the ballot box, Haitian police spokesman Frantz Lerebours said. (AP)

18 June - Student demonstrators attacked and burned a UN police vehicle in the Haitian capital on Wednesday, adding to security concerns ahead of this weekend's scheduled Senate elections. The student protests, now in their fourth week, are part of a general uptick in violence leading into Sunday's scheduled second-round elections for 11 vacant Senate seats. At least two people have been killed in clashes between political parties elsewhere in Haiti.

Two UN police officers were driving past the state university medical school when students bombarded it with rocks and forced it to halt, said UN police spokesman Fred Blaise. The officers escaped unharmed and the demonstrators burned the vehicle down to its metal husk. Peacekeepers from India and Jordan arrived and formed a perimeter around the SUV. Students threw rocks at the soldiers from inside the campus and peacekeepers responded with repeated rounds of tear gas. Haitian riot police stood at the ready nearby. When peacekeepers and police left after towing the vehicle amid a driving rainstorm, hundreds of onlookers rushed in from the surrounding neighborhood dancing and chanting, "Burn them! Burn them!" Peacekeepers fired a final canister of tear gas as they sped away on the rock-strewn street.

The student demonstrations began in late May against the elimination of medical school classes but quickly grew into protests against the 9,000-member UN force that has been in Haiti since 2004, and in support of increasing Haiti's minimum wage from $2 to $5 a day. The salary increase has been approved by the legislature but is opposed by business owners, especially owners of factories that produce garments for sale in the United States and elsewhere. An agreement is expected to be announced by President Rene Preval this week. (AP)

6 June - Police injured a 10-year-old boy as they fired warning shots Friday to control a protest entering its second day. A reporter for The Associated Press saw the boy get shot in his right shoulder. A bullet also grazed the cheek of a university student who was taken to the hospital. Another man was shot in the leg when an off-duty policeman fired at a crowd after being pelted with stones, Radio Metropole reported.

Hundreds of university students are demanding that school officials reinstate courses and that the government keep its promise of raising the minimum wage. The boy was shot as supporters tried to loot a supermarket near the national palace. Protesters also burned cars and threw rocks at police. A university student shot Thursday is recovering from a minor head injury. (AP)

4 June - Police fired tear gas and gunshots Thursday to deter protesters in Haiti's capital, and at least one student was wounded. About 300 university students threw rocks at police and national guard officers as they marched down barricaded streets and protested curriculum changes. A car also was set on fire. Authorities responded by shooting into the air and launching tear gas. Three students from a primary school were hospitalized after breathing the fumes. Hundreds of people poured out of a nearby church Thursday afternoon after getting trapped inside by tear gas and protesters. Children were crying and some people poured water on a couple of women who had fainted.

Students have clashed with police in recent months as they criticize university officials for canceling classes they say they need to become well-rounded professionals. A photographer for The Associated Press saw doctors on Thursday treating the injured student for a minor head wound. (AP)

MAY
22 May - At least 10 people have died due to severe floods caused by the heavy rains in Haiti over the past days, according to a report given by the local civil protection organization on Thursday. The heavy rains forced the Haitian authorities to declare a red alert in four departments in Haiti. The report included five deaths in Artibonite, in the north, another three in the Central Plateau region, and two in the south, one of them a boy. The rains have provoked floods in different regions, affecting homes and agriculture, with the effect of the damage not yet having been evaluated. (Prensa Latina)

19 May - Former President Bill Clinton, who has pledged his philanthropic weight to help a storm-ravaged Haiti, has been named a special envoy on behalf of the United Nations. The appointment comes two months after Clinton visited Haiti alongside UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in an effort to raise global attention to the country's halting efforts to rebuild following a string of storms that wreaked havoc on the Haitian economy, its nine million citizens and its already fragile landscape.

''It is an honor to accept the secretary general's invitation to become special envoy to Haiti,'' former President Clinton said in a statement to The Miami Herald. 'Last year's natural disasters took a great toll, but Haiti's government and people have the determination and ability to `build back better,' not just to repair the damage done but to lay the foundations for the long-term sustainable development that has eluded them for so long.''

The UN currently has no special envoy for Haiti, and it is expected that Clinton will travel there at least four times a year as part of the UN's effort to build on the momentum created by his March visit.

''We are very grateful to the secretary general that he chose such a friend of Haiti with a worldwide reputation, who is very committed to Haiti,'' Haiti's Prime Minister Michèle Pierre-Louis told The Miami Herald in a telephone interview from Port-au-Prince.

The hope is that Clinton's attention -- and fundraising power -- will help to further galvanize international support in a country plagued by donor fatigue, lack of international coordination and a history of political instability. ''Haiti's got a chance, the best chance in my lifetime,'' Clinton said in April as Haiti supporters met in Washington at a donor's conference. Encouraging donors to not just donate money but to invest, he told the packed room, ``the people on the ground want their country to matter.'' By day's end, international donors pledged $324 million including $57 million from the United States. A few days later, Clinton's wife Secretary of State Hillary Clinton personally traveled to Haiti to emphasize President Barack Obama's strong commitment to the country's rebuilding efforts. ''He's going to be extremely helpful to the country because we are really in dire need of support,'' Pierre-Louis said.

Case in point: Donors' pledges. The latest data from the Inter-American Development Bank, which hosted the conference, shows that donors pledged $353.4 million to Haiti. But a month later, Pierre-Louis said the country is still waiting for the money. ''They all claim we had a plan, a good plan,'' Pierre-Louis said. ``However, it's very difficult to obtain from them where they want to put the money. . . . A special envoy could help in making the follow-up with the donors on the conference first and help us go to new donors.'' (Miami Herald)

13 May -Ten people were killed when a boat carrying migrants from Haiti capsized off the coast of Florida, the US Coast Guard has said. The Coast Guard was able to pluck 27 people from the water on Wednesday, 17 of whom were healthy and 10 "confirmed dead," said spokeswoman Marilyn Fajardo. "They are immigrants from Haiti," said Fajardo who added that it appeared they were trying to illegally enter the United States from the Bahamas.(AFP)

8 May - Angry demonstrators hurled stones and tore down a sign at the Dominican Republic's consulate in Port-au-Prince on Friday to protest the decapitation slaying of a Haitian in Santo Domingo. Some 150 protesters massed outside the walled consulate, but Haitian police prevented them from entering the compound. Contingents of UN peacekeepers with riot gear waited nearby but did not enter the fray. The protesters chanted "justice for Carlos," in reference to Carlos Nerilus, a migrant whose decapitated body was found Saturday in what Dominican authorities described as an "incident between individuals." Haitian officials have called the migrant's killing barbarous and questioned whether Dominican police could have prevented it. (AP)

6 May - Some of Haiti's most powerful lawmakers are calling for last month's parliamentary elections to be thrown out because of allegations of voter fraud and political manipulation. Senator Youri Latortue, the powerful head of the chamber's justice and security committee, and at least three other senators said this week that they would try to block victors of next month's run-offs from taking office to protest the results. It is not clear what effect the lawmakers' protests will have, but fraud allegations could prove troubling in this impoverished Caribbean country where disputed elections have been the precursor to violence and upheaval in recent years.

The long-delayed election to fill 12 vacant spots in the 30-seat Senate was hailed as an important step in Haiti's development as a democracy. But the April 19 first-round voting was marred by low turnout, officially 11 percent, and isolated violence that forced one race to be canceled. Election officials were also widely criticized for barring all candidates from the major opposition party of exiled former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Fanmi Lavalas, from running on technical grounds. (AP)

5 May - After months of delays the Haitian Senate voted unanimously on May 5 to approve a measure raising the minimum wage to 200 gourdes a day (about $4.96) from its current rate of 70 gourdes. The Chamber of Deputies approved the measure earlier in the year. To become law, the raise still needs to be approved by President Préval and published in the official gazette, Le Moniteur. Business owners strongly opposed the new minimum wage, and it is not clear what measures are planned to enforce it. (AlterPresse)

5 May - Dominican police are investigating the decapitation of a migrant from neighbouring Haiti. Police Maj. Jose Llubres says the victim's body was found Saturday in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of the capital, Santo Domingo. He says residents allege the victim killed a local merchant and police are investigating whether he was slain in revenge. (AP)

1 May - Haitian police used tear gas to break up a protest near the national palace where demonstrators were calling for a higher minimum wage. Riot police also used their batons and shields Friday to block the group of about 150 protesters from reaching the palace. The protesters say they are an "alternative May 1" collective and called for raising the minimum wage from about US$1.80 a day to US$10 a day. Eighty percent of the Caribbean nation's people live on less than US$2 a day and unemployment is rampant. The group also called for the departure of a 9,000-member UN peacekeeping force they denounced as occupiers. (AP)

"It's not normal for us to be unable to demonstrate peacefully and freely on May 1," said a member of the organising committee of the collective, which is made up of the Popular Democratic Movement (MODEP), Tèt Kole Ti Peyizan Ayisyen ("Small Haitian Peasants Unity"), Batay Ouvriye ("Workers Struggle") and other groups. (AlterPresse)

APRIL
28 April - None of the candidates for the Senate received the majority vote needed to win outright in balloting this month, leaving 11 vacant seats up for grabs in the runoff election.The 30-seat Senate has been short-handed for 1 1/2 years as elections were delayed by hunger riots, devastating storms and political infighting. Results released late Monday by Haiti's provisional electoral council also showed 11 percent of eligible voters turned out for the April 19 election. The vote was boycotted by supporters of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, whose Fanmi Lavalas party's candidates were disqualified because they failed to produce documents signed by the exiled party leader.

Nine of the 20 candidates advancing to the run-off are from President Rene Preval's Lespwa party, and the party could win seats in each of Haiti's administrative regions. Two other parties had multiple candidates advance. Lespwa currently controls six of 18 seats in the Caribbean nation's Senate. A Lespwa majority would help Preval win support for constitutional reforms to increase executive powers and build support for his economic programs.

Voting for one of 12 vacant seats in the rural Central Department was canceled on election day after protesters raided polling places and a poll supervisor was shot. He survived. That vote has not been rescheduled. Some voters also had difficulty reaching the polls because authorities halted public transportation in Port-au-Prince to preserve order. Only about 44,000 ballots were cast in a capital region home to nearly 3 million people. At least four senators have said the election should be invalidated because of the poor turnout and are threatening to vote against seating the winners, Radio Kiskeya reported. (AP)

22 April - Despite the fact that journalists and peacekeepers seemed to outnumber voters last week, several people were wounded and voting was disrupted by violence on Sunday during a Senate election. After polls closed, observers estimated that fewer than 10 percent of potential voters went to the polls. One man, according to an unconfirmed report, was attacked with machetes and then burned alive by residents of the village of Liancourt in Haiti's northern Artibonite region. Several other people were wounded during clashes between supporters of rival candidates. Haitian police and UN forces exchanged fire with civilian gunmen in the northern town of Marchand Dessalines. One member of the security forces was wounded, according to local election officials, who did not provide further details. Other violent confrontations, as well as massive frauds, in the Central Plateau area prompted election authorities to cancel the ballot in the whole region. Elections will likely not be known for more than a week despite the low turnout, an election official said Monday.

Voting for 11 vacant seats in the 30-member Senate took place across the country Sunday after a year and a half of delays caused by political infighting, riots and damaging storms. It will take at least eight days to count ballots trucked in from the countryside and determine winners, said Jean-Marc Baudot, a Canadian consultant serving as logistics coordinator for the provisional electoral council's computation center. Baudot said that officials have not been able to gauge the turnout yet, but it appeared to be low, based on the observations of balloting observers and reporters covering the elections. Ballots are being counted at polling places and tabulated at a warehouse computer center guarded by armed UN peacekeepers in an industrial park in the capital, Port-au-Prince.

Turnout appeared to be extremely low in the capital, where voter apathy and fear of election-day violence were more common than political interest. President Rene Preval declined to comment on the turnout Sunday until official results are calculated. US Ambassador Janet Sanderson, who toured the tabulation center Monday, remarked that "Historically, off-year elections in the United States as well as in other countries tend not to be as well-attended as presidential elections. We'll have to see."

Supporters of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide — whose still-popular Fanmi Lavalas party was prohibited from running by electoral officials — had also encouraged citizens to stay away from the polls. The party took credit for the apparently low turnout Sunday.

Voting for a 12th seat from the rural Central Department was halted by Haiti's provisional electoral council after demonstrators ransacked polling places and a poll supervisor was shot in the plateau town of Mirebalais. That race will be rescheduled. (Haitian Times)

16 April - The US economic crisis touched down recently in the dusty town where Marie Rosita Simon ekes out a living selling sandals. Her brother, a New Jersey cabdriver, slashed his monthly $400 transfer to her by half because his business was off. For Simon, that amounted to a 40 percent plunge in income for her family of five. Coming after a horrendous year in which food prices soared and hurricanes washed away her plantain and bean crops, the 43-year-old street vendor decided something had to go: dinner. And sometimes she can't provide breakfast for her children. They're hungry," she confessed.

Shrinking remittances are one of the main ways the crisis could harm Latin America and the Caribbean. The cash sent home from immigrant nannies, hotel workers and gardeners from Los Angeles to Bethesda has ballooned to a US$69 billion-a-year lifeline in the region in the past decade. It is particularly important for small countries such as Haiti, which received about $1.65 billion last year -- more than a quarter of the country's annual income. These transfers have dropped 13 percent in the region in the first few months of the year, according to Luis Alberto Moreno, president of the Inter-American Development Bank.

In Haiti, the reduction in remittances can have dramatic long-term consequences. Most schools are private, and students are often kept home when parents can't pay the tuition, returning months or years later.

Jimmy Pierre-Sant, a 25-year-old in Cabaret, a plantain-growing town about 30 miles north of Port-au-Prince, is one of the indirect victims of the U.S. recession. Several months ago, his aunt in Winter Haven, Fla., was laid off from her factory job. Short of cash, she and other relatives have cut their bimonthly payments to Pierre-Sant's family from about $200 to $50. That meant he had to quit school yet again. "I felt very bad about it. I'm the only one in my family who got to 11th grade. I was ahead of everybody. I loved school," Pierre-Sant, in a Bugle Boy T-shirt and plaid shorts, said as he sat on the concrete patio of his grandmother's shack, where he sells soft drinks from a cooler.

Simon, the sandal seller, who also lives in Cabaret, has managed to keep her two children and the niece she is raising in school. But at times there is only enough money for one meal a day. "Sometimes I let them suffer in order to pay the school tuition. I never had to do that in the past," she said. (Washington Post)

MARCH
21 March - The former CEO of Haiti's national pension fund has been arrested and jailed on money laundering charges. Radio Kiskeya says Sandro Joseph was arrested at home Thursday and taken in handcuffs to Port-au-Prince's National Penitentiary. Prosecutors confirmed the report Friday but declined to comment. Joseph's lawyer, Me Annibal Coffy, told Le Nouvelliste newspaper he would challenge the warrant. Joseph resigned last year from his government-appointed post at the National Old-Age Insurance Office following corruption allegations. Officials have not said how much money he is suspected of laundering or named others allegedly involved. A trial date has not been set. (AP)

12 March - A UN Security Council delegation arrived in Haiti Wednesday for a four-day visit to promote stability and economic progress. Delegation leader and Costa Rican ambassador Jorge Urbina said the 15-member group will meet with President Rene Preval, lawmakers, election officials, and the private sector. Protesters stoned and burned a UN vehicle in front of a Port-au-Prince university shortly before the mission arrived. (AP)

10 March - Bill Clinton and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited Haiti yesterday, hoping to lure more aid to keep the impoverished country from sliding back into chaos. The former US president and the UN chief toured the rundown capital and met with Haitian officials who are struggling with high food prices and the aftermath of devastating storms during a period of relative political calm. The delegation, that includes Haitian-born singer Wyclef Jean, stopped at a school to view a recently opened food programme for children. Ban spokeswoman, Michele Montas, said the visit was intended to call attention to the need to provide further international help for Haiti. (AP)

3 March - University students in Port-au-Prince barricaded themselves inside an administration building Tuesday, and clashed with police and UN peacekeepers during protests to demand an improved curriculum. Police responded by firing at least two rounds of tear gas at the State University of Haiti building in the hills above Port-au-Prince. At least one student was arrested, Radio Vision 2000 reported. No injuries were reported. Several car windows were smashed near the building and a thrown rock smashed through the windshield of a UN vehicle that was passing by. (AP)

3 March - Deepening poverty and ineffective governance have left Haiti at risk for renewed violence and political instability, a conflict watchdog warned on Tuesday. The Brussels-based International Crisis Group urged international donors scheduled to meet next month in Washington to provide the struggling Caribbean country with $3 billion over the next several years. "Between now and the summer Haiti faces a series of challenges, and if the population doesn't see progress it could well result in significant instability," ICG senior vice president Mark Schneider told The Associated Press by phone.

A 16-page report by the conflict watchdog comes ahead of a March 9 visit by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and former US President Bill Clinton to promote international aid and economic security in the impoverished country. The UN Security Council will visit immediately afterward.

Haiti is enjoying a period of relative stability, but the report says economic and social conditions are even worse than last April, when political riots over high food prices overthrew the prime minister. Months later the country was socked by four storms that left nearly 800 people dead, caused $1 billion in damage and halted economic growth. Tuesday's report says poor cooperation between President Rene Preval, new Prime Minister Michele Pierre-Louis and parliament is also deadlocking legislation and preventing passage of a proposed $256.4 million, mostly donor-financed budget. That in turn could leave the door open for "spoilers" — drug traffickers, corrupt politicians, gangs and business owners who prefer a weak government — to create new problems. Illegal flights carrying South American cocaine through Haiti and on to the United States and Europe increased over the past year, the US State Department said in its annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report released this week.

Reminders of how quickly any tension can boil over into violence in Haiti were on display Tuesday in Port-au-Prince when university students threw rocks at UN peacekeepers and Haitian police, who responded by firing tear gas. The students were protesting a curriculum change.

Observers worry far more violent demonstrations could erupt ahead of a long-delayed April 19 election to fill 12 vacant Senate seats, with concern centering on electoral officials' decision to block all candidates from former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's divided Famni Lavalas party. (AP)