In the past year, the Haitian National Police (HNP) Force has committed serious human rights abuses, including extrajudicial executions, beatings in detention, and killings resulting from an excessive use of force. While the HNP has shown a willingness to discipline and fire human rights violators within its ranks, Haitian courts have imposed minimal criminal sanctions on abusive officers or simply dismissed charges against them. Unfortunately, the U.S. government's failure to deliver critical military documents to the Haitian government (documents that U.S. forces seized from Haitian military and paramilitary headquarters in 1994) continues to impede human rights investigations and prosecutions of past abuses.
"While Washington has supported the reform of Haiti's judicial system, the Clinton administration simultaneously has erected roadblocks to establishing truth and justice for past abuses in Haiti," said José Miguel Vivanco, the executive director of the Americas Division of Human Rights Watch.
Questions for President Clinton: The U.S.-backed Haitian police force, and particularly its riot control unit known as CIMO, has been implicated in serious human rights violations, including extrajudicial executions. What are you doing to stop police violence in Haiti? While stating its support for judicial reform in Haiti, the U.S. has obstructed justice in human rights cases by failing to return documents seized by U.S. forces in Haiti in September 1994. Some have attributed this delay to a U.S. interest in blocking information about CIA support for the paramilitary group, FRAPH. How can you explain this delay, and when will you return these materials to the Haitian government?