The Haitian Senate voted on July 31 to ratify the appointment of economist Michele Duvivier Pierre-Louis as prime minister. Twelve of the 18 senators present voted in favor, and five abstained; as required by the regulations, Senate president Kelly Bastien… Read moreHaiti finally gets a prime minister
A mission representing several Brazilian government ministries arrived in Haiti on July 19 for a two-week visit aimed at developing a plan for combatting hunger in the country. A pilot project will be modeled on Brazil’s Program of Acquisition of… Read moreHaiti: Brazil offers food program
Computers confiscated by US customs agents in Texas at the beginning of July finally arrived in Cuba on Aug. 1 in a cargo of 100 tons of humanitarian aid raised by the New York-based group Pastors for Peace in its… Read moreCuba: US computers reach Havana
On July 25 a jury in Brooklyn, New York, convicted right-wing paramilitary leader Emmanuel (“Toto”) Constant of mortgage fraud. He faces a 5-to-15 prison sentence in New York, followed by deportation to Haiti. “The trial proved there is rampant fraud… Read moreHaitian death squad leader convicted in New York —of mortgage fraud
On June 23 Haitian president Rene Preval nominated economist Michele Duvivier Pierre-Louis to succeed acting prime minister Jacques Edouard Alexis, who was forced to resign on April 12 following violent protests over the rising cost of food. Preval made two… Read moreHaiti: third try to appoint prime minister
Some 100 members of the 19th US-Cuba Friendshipment Caravan, an annual shipment of humanitarian aid organized by the New York-based group Pastors for Peace, arrived in Havana on July 5. Reverend Lucius Walker led the delegation, which was met at… Read moreCuba: US aid caravan reaches Havana
On June 12 Haiti’s Chamber of Deputies voted 57-22 with six abstentions to reject President Rene Garcia Preval’s latest nominee for prime minister, Robert Manuel. A commission assigned to study Manuel’s qualifications found that he failed to meet two requirements… Read moreHaiti: still no prime minister
Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made a brief official visit to Haiti on May 28. During the few hours before he headed off for a tour of Central America, Lula had a private conversation with Haitian president Rene… Read moreHaiti: Lula visits, protests banned
More than 1,000 people, mostly peasants, marched through the streets of Savanette, near the Dominican border in Haiti’s Central Plateau region, on May 19 to protest the local government’s failure to issue proper identity papers. The march also commemorated the… Read moreHaiti: 1,000 peasants protest
The Jesuit Service for Refugees and Migrants reports that at least 1,693 Haitians were deported from the Dominican Republic in the first four months of 2008. The mass repatriations are “almost always marked by violations of the migrants’ human rights,”… Read moreDominican Republic: mass deportation of Haitians
Foreign troops and not Haitian demonstrators killed Spanish journalist Ricardo Ortega in Port-au-Prince during a protest on March 7, 2004, according to the reporter’s family. Haitian judge Bernard Saint-Vil has dismissed charges against the Haitian suspects in the killing, Ortega’s… Read moreHaiti: US blamed in reporter’s death
The US Navy plans to re-establish its Fourth Fleet, disbanded in 1950, to oversee ships, aircraft and submarines operating in the Caribbean and Central and South America. Rear Admiral Joseph Kernan, current commander of the Naval Special Warfare Command, will… Read moreUS Navy revives Fourth Fleet to police Latin America
