Baby Doc' Duvalier's surprise return

Few answers in Haiti after 'Baby Doc' Duvalier's surprise return

By the CNN Wire Staffc/div>

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v Human rights groups urged Haiti to arrest and prosecute the former dictator.
"Duvalier's return to Haiti should be for one purpose only: to face justice," said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director of Human Rights Watch. "Under the presidency of Duvalier ... thousands were killed and tortured, and hundreds of thousands of Haitians fled into exile. His time to be held accountable is long overdue."
Amnesty International similarly said Duvalier should be brought to justice.
"The widespread and systematic human rights violations committed in Haiti during Duvalier's rule amount to crimes against humanity," said Javier Zuniga, special adviser at Amnesty International. "Haiti is under the obligation to prosecute him and anyone else responsible for such crimes."
The Duvalier family ruled Haiti for three decades, starting in 1957 when Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier was elected president. He later declared himself president for life. When he died in 1971, he was succeeded by his 19-year-old son, Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier.
The younger Duvalier held onto power for 15 years before a revolt forced him to flee the country. Widely accused of corruption, Duvalier has been living in France.
He has maintained some support in Haiti. At the offices of the National Unity Party, a few dozen of his supporters gathered around a television to listen to news reports.
"President Jean-Claude Duvalier, by coming back into the country it is a victory for Haiti," said Jean Etienne, an engineering student. "When President Jean-Claude Duvalier was in the country, it wasn't like it is now. It was better."
The former dictator is at the Karibe Hotel in Petionville, a suburb of Port-au-Prince. He arrived there Sunday night.
"There's definite energy in the air right now," said Ryan Flaherty, head of security for Project Medishare.
"Right now, people don't know what he's back here for. People don't know if he is just visiting, or if he's here to talk about the earthquake and relief ... or, is he going to make a political move?" said Flaherty. "It's just going to be interesting to hear what he has to say."
Sunday, the United Nations restricted the movement of its staff in Port-au-Prince until further notice, or until the effects of the former leader's arrival becomes clear, said Patrick Hanson, a security officer for the United Nations in Haiti.
While groups of people were gathered in various parts of the city, they are calm and no violence has been reported, he said.
The United States likewise said it was caught off guard by Duvalier's unexpected return.
"We are surprised by the timing of Duvalier's visit to Haiti. It adds unpredictability at an uncertain time in Haiti's election process," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in a tweet.
Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council released preliminary election results in early December that showed former first lady Mirlande Manigat with 31.4% of the vote. Jude Celestin, President Rene Preval's handpicked successor, came in second with 22.3%, while popular musician Michel Martelly was third with 21.8%.
However, a review of the results conducted by an Organization of American States monitoring team showed Martelly winning 22.2% of the vote to Celestin's 21.9%, affording Martelly a spot in a runoff election with Manigat.
Haiti's constitution mandates a new presidential term starting on February 7, but it is unclear whether that will happen.
Efforts to elect a new president are unfolding as the country is still struggling to rebuild after last year's devastating earthquake. Last week, Haiti marked the first anniversary of that quake, which left more than 200,000 people dead.
Agnes Pierre-Louis, a local business owner, said Haitians are anxiously waiting to see what the government will do next, now that Duvalier has returned. So far, Preval's administration has remained silent.

"There are so many parties here and so many mixed feelings that it's really hard to know who to turn to at the moment," she said. "We don't know what the next week or the next couple of days will bring."

CNN's Kim Segal and journalist Jean Junior Osman contributed to this report.

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As Venezuela Professionals Leave, Foreigners Move In - NYTimes.com

November 6, 2010

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In Venezuela, a New Wave of Foreigners

By SIMON ROMERO

CARACAS, Venezuela — On this booming continent, oil-rich Venezuela is the exception: South America’s only shrinking economy this year. Officials are rationing hard currency. Government takeovers of private businesses are increasing. One prominent financial analyst recently had just two words of advice for investors here: “Run away.”

Many middle-class and wealthy Venezuelans have done exactly that, creating a slow-burning exodus of scientists, doctors, entrepreneurs and engineers. But wander into the bazaar in the shadow of Santa Teresa Basilica in this city’s old center, and the opposite seems to be happening as well.

Merchants murmur in Arabic, Urdu and Hindi. Haitians pushing ice cream cartschatter in Creole. Street vendors selling DVDs call out in Colombian-accented Spanish. Sip coffee in Naji Hammoud’s clothing shop, where photos of Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley grace the walls, and the outlook is downright bullish.

“There’s money in the street, whether the price of oil is $8 a barrel or $80,” said Mr. Hammoud, 36, who came here from Lebanon a decade ago and has no plans to leave. “I could have moved to Europe, Germany, someplace, and done fine, but I would have been someone’s employee. Here, I’m my own boss.”

Venezuela is in the throes of an immigration puzzle. While large numbers of the middle class head for the exits, hundreds of thousands of foreign merchants and laborers have put down stakes here in recent years, complicating the portrait of how a brain drain unfolds.

The opposing tides reflect the increasingly polarized nature of the country. The government of President Hugo Chávez, who recently declared an “economic war” against the “bourgeoisie,” has expropriated 207 private businesses this year — including banks, cattle ranches and housing developments, according to Conindustria, a Venezuelan industrial association — prompting many to seek safer havens elsewhere.

Ice cream sales a lifeline for Haitians in Caracas

Ice cream sales a lifeline for Haitians in Caracas
By Charlie Devereux
Reuters
Monday, March 22, 2010; 5:06 PM

CARACAS (Reuters) - Emilton Amboise pounds the Caracas streets in the middle of a tropical heatwave, hoping to sell enough ice cream to send money home to family in Haiti.
Like so many, Amboise lost relatives in the January 12 earthquake that devastated the Caribbean nation and killed more than 200,000 people. "One of my sisters died and many cousins and friends too," he said.
Pushing a refrigerated cart full of Popsicles around the sweltering Venezuelan capital, Amboise estimates he can make around $300 a month, of which he sends $50 to his family -- the equivalent of about two weeks wages in Haiti.
"With the money I send to my family at least they can eat," he said.
The roughly 30,000-strong Haitian community in Venezuela have a near-monopoly on selling ice cream in the streets.
Martin Rangel, who manages a depot for ice cream brand Efe, said almost 70 percent of the vendors working for him are Haitian. The rest are immigrants too. "They can earn good money without having to invest in equipment," he said.
Rangel hands out carts full of ice cream to vendors who take a 26 percent commission on whatever they sell. Ice cream sellers can earn up to double the Venezuelan minimum wage, and as much as three times what they could earn back in Haiti.
That has attracted even educated Haitians like Kernizan Chrisnot, a 27-year-old from Port-au-Prince who spent four years studying law.
"Even with my qualifications, I could not find any work in Haiti so I decided to come here," he told Reuters at Rangel's warehouse in Catia, in western Caracas, while he tallied up how many ice creams he had sold that day.
OVERSTAY VISAS
The Haitian Embassy in Venezuela has some 15,000 registered Haitians in the country, although many more have entered illegally or overstay their tourist visas.
That makes many of them vulnerable to harassment and extortion by the police. Since the quake, however, Haitians have noticed a change in attitude.
"The police used to ask for our papers and if we didn't have any they took our money," said another ice cream vendor, 29-year-old Jonas Fleurglus. "But since the earthquake they have left us alone."
The Venezuelan government began a campaign last week to register the estimated 15,000 more Haitians thought to be living illegally in the country. All Haitians who have been in Venezuela since before the earthquake will now be granted visas, the government's immigration office said.
More than a tenth of Haiti's population lives abroad, including around one million in the United States, according to Leslie David, Consular Minister at the Haitian Embassy in Venezuela. Many more have sought asylum abroad since the quake.
David welcomed the Venezuelan government's move to legalize the status of Haitians in Venezuela, but said he worried about how a Haitian 'brain drain' could affect his country in the future. "People need to stay in Haiti to rebuild it," he said.
Many Haitians say they want to return home to see their families. But with little prospect of work there, Venezuela remains a better bet for now.
"If there was work in Haiti I'd be there, but at the moment here is better," said Amboise.
Ice cream sales a lifeline for Haitians in Caracas

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