Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 7 juillet 2022

 Bribery charges dismissed against two prominent Haitian-American businessmen

Dr. Joseph Baptiste's Facebook pageUpdated June 28, 2022 3:48 PM

Dr. Joseph Baptiste, the chair and founder of the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians, was granted a new trial after he was convicted in June 2019 in a Boston federal court in an alleged bribery scheme involving Haitian government officials. However, with that new trial set to start in early July 2022, federal prosecutors have dismissed the case as more evidence came to light.

Federal prosecutors will no longer be pursuing bribery charges against two Haitian-American businessmen after prosecutors discovered evidence contradicting FBI agents’ testimony and the Department of Justice’s own allegations that one of the men offered to pay a 5% bribe to Haitian officials to construct a new seaport in Haiti’s northwest region.

Federal prosecutors had accused Roger Richard Boncy and Dr. Joseph Baptiste of conspiring to funnel bribes of 5% of the cost of the construction deal to high-level Haitian government officials, including an aide to a prime minister. The 5% was “a key part of the government’s conspiracy theory.” The U.S. government also contended that the money would be funneled through Baptiste’s National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians, NOAH, a well-known nonprofit. 

The two men — Boncy is a former Haitian ambassador-at-large, and Baptiste is a Maryland dentist and retired Haitian-American U.S. Army colonel who ran NOAH — were convicted in June 2019 in federal court of conspiring to pay millions of dollars in bribes to Haitian government officials to build the port. 

Jurors in Boston had found both men, who were tried together, of conspiring to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Travel Act. Baptiste was also convicted of conspiracy to commit money laundering and an additional Travel Act violation, while Boncy was cleared of the two counts.

A federal judge later overturned the jury’s conviction after Baptiste successfully appealed on the grounds of ineffective counsel from his lawyer. A new trial for both men was set to start next week. 

However, on Monday, U.S. prosecutors filed to dismiss the case after confirming that previously undisclosed text messages between Boncy and an undercover FBI agent confirmed the existence of a destroyed recording in which Boncy asserted that he knew nothing about the alleged 5% bribe. 

The new information confirming Boncy’s lack of knowledge was turned over to the defense and the government. 

Legal experts say the discovery of the text messages, which no longer support FBI agents’ testimony about Boncy’s alleged involvement, would raise credibility concerns in any trial had the government decided to still pursue charges against Baptiste. 

In a statement, Boncy’s legal team at the law firm Greenberg Traurig noted that he had long maintained his innocence and insisted that two calls the FBI destroyed would prove his innocence. 

“These texts — sent on the same day of the destroyed calls — specifically referenced the contents of the destroyed calls. In those texts, consistent with Boncy’s long-held defense, the FBI agent explicitly stated that ‘Richard said 5% social program money is absolutely not for bribes.’ This is exactly what Boncy has claimed all along. 

“And, more egregiously, the existence and content of these texts are directly at odds with the FBI special agents’ testimony throughout this case.” the statement said.

Jed Dwyer, who led Boncy’s defense, said: “It is clear now that Richard is innocent; no ifs, ands or buts about it. The government agrees and today dismissed the sole remaining count against our client.”

Dwyer said Boncy was adamant in his innocence and his commitment to proving his innocence. “Richard had the courage to stand up to the government, which is a rarity these days. ... Too often the government rides roughshod over defendants.”

Baptiste lawyers noted that the case had gone on for nearly five years.

“Dr. Baptiste never paid a penny in bribes, and he never agreed with Mr. Boncy or anyone else to do so,” said one of his attorneys, Daniel Marx. “Dr. Baptiste’s work to build a port in an especially impoverished part of Haiti was consistent with his lifelong commitment to improve the lives of Haitian people, in Haiti and elsewhere.” 

William Fick, co-counsel for Baptiste, said his client and Boncy “were unfortunate victims of a misguided ‘sting’ operation, in which FBI agents posed as foreign investors and played on prejudiced tropes about pervasive Haitian corruption.”

“Those agents knew nothing about Haiti, a country they had never even visited,” Fick said. “The agents had never spoken with the officials who were supposedly offered bribes or considered how their undercover operation might derail a significant development project that could better the lives of countless Haitian people.”

This story was originally published June 28, 2022 9:25 AM.

National Center of Haitian Apostolate 

REFLECTIONS ON THE READINGS OF TH 14^TH SUNDAY OF THE CHURCH YEAR (JULY 3^rd, 2022)

https://youtu.be/c_nBHIS_6uU

Isaiah 66, 10-14; Psalm 66; Galatians 6, 14-18; Luke 10, 1-9

Jesus is asking us to pray for vocations:

“The harvest is abundant and the laborers are few. Pray the lord of the harvest to send laborers in his field.” China with its 1 300 000 000 inhabitants, India with its One billion and plus citizens have hardly heard of Jesus. Many countries tend to close their hearts to the Christian message. Powerful witnesses are desperately needed. We hear today that the prayers of the faithful are crucial for vocations. The Lord likes prayers to precede his gifts.

The mission of the laborers is challenging. They must be “like lambs in the midst of wolves.” They should not act as conquerors but like persuasive heralds of the Good News. Let them shout that the kingdom of God is near and that it is close to every person of good will!

The call to the kingdom is not to be the exclusive domain of the ordained ministers. Jesus is shown sending seventy-two disciples meaning lay people. Every baptized person is commissioned to participate in the spreading of the Kingdom. We are a holy nation, a priestly people. We must be aware of our communal responsibility to The Mission. 

Jesus adds count in the first place on the power of God working through you! St Paul adds that to be successful you really need to believe in the power of the Cross and become a New Creation. Jesus concludes that your unshakable trust must rest on the assurance that your name is written in heaven! May lay people and priests involve themselves wholeheartedly in the Mission!

Transforming Our Caribbean 

#AllThingsCSA

#CSA2023StCroix

Greetings Caribbean Studies Association Members, Supporters and Family:

In 2022, CSA has the honorable pleasure of celebrating our 48^thAnniversary among an awesome intergenerational legacy of Caribbeanists! 

Happy 48^th CSA Anniversary!

 I am honored to serve as CSA President for 2022-2023.  

As your CSA President, I welcome the continuation of supportive guidance from seasoned, intergenerational, and sagacious CSA leaders, scholars, elders, graduate students, and Caribbeanist practitioners who desire to strengthen standards of excellence, diversity, equity, inclusion, and prosperity that sustainably contributes to the forward progress to CSA2023 St. Croix leading to CSA’s 50^th Anniversary in 2024 and beyond.   As shared during my vice-presidency 2021-2022, the creation of environs that welcome assessments of existing conditions, evaluations of best standards of action, and data-driven practices for successful programs that are strategically relevant to 21^st century interdisciplinary, multilingual, and multicultural Caribbean studies, arts, sciences, and affairs are being prioritized.  CSA members and resourceful supporters are invited to share collaborative talents and collective expertise with the new CSA Executive Council (EC) to innovatively maintain the effective aspects of the Caribbeanist philosophical mission, vision, perspectives, protocols, principles, and practices of CSA with sound futuristic improvements as may be essential for organizational growth while being unapologetically and respectfully Caribbean.

Congratulations are extended to Immediate Past President Eris Schoburgh (2021-2022) who led the CSA2022 Jamaica Conference hosted by The University of the West Indies-Mona Campus with her supportive Program Committee co-chairs Stacey-Ann Wilson and Eleanor A. Henry with a hard-working team to organize CSA’s second virtual conference with successes beyond C19 protocol limitations and technological challenges.  Thanks are extended to CSA IT Master Kiah Graham along with UWI IT support from Howard Reid, Richard Leach and others working in the background keeping CSA membership informed, digitally empowered, calm (most of the time), and proactively engaged throughout the virtual implementation of new digital technology platforms for CSA2022 Jamaica.  Recognition and thanks are extended to past CSA EC members whose tenure expired in June 2021, yet they remained dedicated for an additional year to support CSA leadership for which we remain grateful: Nikoli Attai, Fatimah Jackson-Best and Raymond Laureano.

Special thanks are extended to the Jamaican Government (for making travel to Jamaica open, safe and welcoming in May 2022) specifically the Ministries of Education and Tourism for making CSA2022 safe and technologically savvy while making the open portal entry accessible for the new CSA Vice President and President while in Kingston. A special heartfelt thanks to Sharon Oshun Parris-Chambers and Theo Chambers of PanaCarib Business Solutions and Temple of Inner Peace for the exceptional Jamaican hospitality, ecotourism excursions, and communitarian cultural heritage exchanges provided for us during CSA2022 Jamaica. At my request, as pictured, on the evening following the CSA leadership transition morning meeting on Saturday, June 4.2022 an amicable safe social gathering was facilitated at the AC Marriott Bonvoy in Kingston. 

CSA members are encouraged to join me in welcoming new and returning seasoned, intellectually experienced, and diverse CSA Executive Council (EC) members effective June 2022.  Congratulations to new CSA EC members: Okama Ekpe Brook, Vice President (2022-2023) and Council Members Rhoda Arrindell, Nicholas Faraclas, and L. Kaifa Roland (2022-2024).  Congratulations to continuing CSA EC members: IPP Eris Schoburgh, Kristina Hinds, Patricia Saunders, Meagan Sylvester (CSA Newsletter Editor/CSA2023 St. Croix Program Chair), and Graduate Student Representative Regan Reid.  

CSA@48 welcomes the continuation of the appointments accepted by Dwaine Plaza, Treasurer/Past President and Mala Jokhan, Secretariat complementary to CSA Past Presidents, Elders and resourceful friends providing support for this important organization for Caribbeanists nationally, regionally, and internationally. The inaugural CSA Journal: Caribbean Conjunctures is preparing for publication launch in Summer 2022.   With an extensive list of multilingual and interdisciplinary editorial and advisory professionals of CSA and beyond, special thanks to Raymond Laureano, Inaugural Managing Editor with Opal Palmer Adisa, Editor-in-Chief, and Tavis Jules, Past President/Interim Managing Editor. 

As announced during the CSA2022 Virtual Business Meeting on June 1^st, CSA2023 St. Croix Virgin Islands (US) is scheduled for June 5^th to 9^th, 2023 with the theme:

Transforming Our Caribbean: Sustainable Educational Research, Cultural Creatives, Sacred Traditions, Economic Development and Environmental Solutions

On the journey to CSA2023, the new CSA EC embraces improving the long-standing legacy and sustainability of CSA through responsive creativity and equitably streamlining multilingual digital technologies, publications, projects, programs, and productions. Examples of CSA priorities include: a) Inaugural CSA Journal 2022 and 2023; b) Continuing publication of the internationally-recognized CSA Newsletter (monthly);  c) Diversification of program platforms, professional development, and services for CSA members; d) Enhancing accessibility to CSA digital/virtual collections; e) Increasing CSA membership; f) Organizing virtual/hybrid CSA webinars and new media/IT programming; g) Continuing the CSA Young Scholars Mentoring Program; and h) Increasing philanthropic and strategic fund developments.  With enhanced branding, marketing, scholarly exchanges and resourceful membership supports, the CSA membership is encouraged to explore the CSA website and monthly newsletter for informative details and relevant programming leading up to CSA2023 St. Croix and beyond.  

The Caribbean and the world have endured challenges and sustained resilient strengths that extend beyond major environmental disasters inclusive of life-threatening hurricanes, devastating earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, toxic emissions, socioeconomic instabilities, climate change and health pandemics that contribute to new global protocols that influence and impact CSA’s responsibility to advance culturally-sensitive and technologically-relevant Caribbeanist solutions while Transforming Our Caribbean.

Be safe, rejuvenate and enjoy the balance of National (US) Caribbean American Heritage Month (June annually), Juneteenth Freedom Day (19^th), Summer Solstice (21^st), VI Freedom Week (June 26^th to July 3^rd) and other Summer Season observances and holidays!

Remain Inspired!

------------------------------------ 

Chenzira Davis Kahina
President CSA 2022-2023  

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 15 juin 2022

 
Haiti’s gangs use TikTok, Instagram, Twitter to recruit and terrorize

(washingtonpost.com)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The man wears a balaclava with a wide, toothy grin on the front — a stark contrast to the angry, threat-laden rant he’s delivering.

If anyone in territory controlled by his 5 Segonn gang is killed, the amateur rapper known as “Izo” warns, he’ll slaughter 30 people in revenge. He repeats the message for his “soldiers.”

“You don’t have to wait for my orders,” Izo says in a video posted this month to tens of thousands of followers on TikTok and Instagram. He won’t show his gun on camera, he says — or his video might be reported to the platforms’ moderators.

The violent armed gangs that control much of Haiti are using social media to expand their reach and tighten their grip on the beleaguered Caribbean nation. Posts aimed at energizing recruits, intimidating rivals and terrorizing the population are challenging the ability of the platforms to police the problematic content. Some here are calling for tighter controls.

“The bandits would never have been as powerful as they are in Haiti without social media,” said Yvens Rumbold of Policité, a policy think tank here. “We always had bandits in Haiti, but without these platforms, they would not be as famous.”

DOJ alleges Haiti gang kidnapped Americans to free leader

Jimmy Cherizier is a former police officer on whom the United States hasimposed sanctions for allegedly leading armed groups in “coordinated, brutal attacks in Port-au-Prince neighborhoods,” the U.S. Treasury said in a release, including a five-day attack in May 2020 in which civilians were slain and houses burned. When Cherizier united warring gangs here into the G9 Family and Allies, he announced the alliance on YouTube. In a Twitter post, an account purporting to belong to him urged backers to “ransack everything.”

As violence between gangs in Port-au-Prince escalated in recent months, gang members posted photos of corpses on WhatsApp, human rights groups say. Izo uses several platforms to threaten and mock rivals, police officers and journalists.

Gangs use social media to promote themselves, push narratives, show their strength, delegitimize state institutions and recruit members. In some posts, gang leaders flash cash, gold chains and blinged-out watches, signifiers of a lifestyle that is far out of reach for the great majority in this impoverished nation.

“Social media is responsible for a lot of the insecurity climate that we have here,” said James Boyard, a political scientist at the State University of Haiti. “Social media has a huge responsibility … to vet their users, to analyze the images on the accounts and to censure them in some instances. They need to do more, frankly.”

Cherizier, in an interview with a sympathizer on YouTube, is asked specifically about the utility of social media.

“I’m thanking those who create these technologies,” he says. “Tech today gives us an opportunity to sell ourselves to the public. I’m not selling lies. I’m who I say I am. I do not do 99 percent of what they said I’ve done. … Technologies gave me an opportunity to defend myself.”

In Haiti, coronavirus and a man named Barbecue test the rule of law

The development troubles some officials here.

In October, Frantz Louis Juste, then Port-au-Prince’s top prosecutor, wrote a letter asking several platforms to “block or delete” the accounts of several individuals, including Cherizier, who he claimed were associated with criminal groups.

“These gangs instill a reign of terror in society,” he told The Washington Post. “They need less widespread publicity.”

The letter was made public but wasn’t sent to the companies that it named.

TikTok’s rules bar terrorist and criminal organizations from using the app. The company removed Izo’s account after The Post asked about it. It said it was reviewing others.

“There’s no place for violent extremism or promotion of violence on TikTok,” a spokesperson wrote in an email. “We will remove content and ban accounts that violate our policies as we work to foster a safe and welcoming environment.”

Twitter said it was reviewing accounts and tweets “in line with our rules.” The company has reported receiving one legal request from Haiti to remove content. That was in 2016.

After being questioned by The Post, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, removed from Izo’s Facebook and Instagram accounts the video in which he threatens to kill 30 people. It did not remove his profiles, and the same video appeared on another Instagram account with his name.

“We regularly review organizations to determine if they violate our Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy and ban them from our platforms if they do,” the company said in a statement. “We use technology to detect violations and deploy global teams, which include native Creole speakers, to review content.”

YouTube did not respond to a request for comment.

Abductions by the busload: Haitians are being held hostage by a surge in kidnappings

Gangs have long had a presence in Haiti, but their power has grown in recent years amid a broader deterioration of democratic institutions and security conditions. Analysts estimate that they control 60 percent of the country and are on the brink of becoming, collectively, a “proto state.”

In recent years, gang kidnappings for ransom have skyrocketed. No one has been immune — victims have included American missionaries, French clergy and Haitians of all ages and backgrounds.

Haiti’s Center for Analysis and Research on Human Rights counted 225 kidnappings in the first quarter of 2022 — up nearly 60 percent from the same period last year.

Since April, armed violence in the capital between 400 Mawozo, the gang implicated in the kidnapping last year of 17 American and Canadian missionaries with an Ohio-based charity, and Chen Mechan, a rival gang, has escalated. The U.N. high commissioner for human rights has called the level of violence “unimaginable and intolerable.”

Nearly 17,000 Haitians have been displaced by the clashes, according to the United Nations, and at least 200 have been killed — almost half of them civilians. Deepening insecurity is one factor fueling an exodus of Haitians on rickety boats bound for the United States and elsewhere on sometimes deadly voyages.

Search for survivors ongoing after migrant boat sinks near Puerto Rico

Haiti’s National Human Rights Defense Network reported last month that gang members in the recent battles had raped women and girls, mutilated bodies and taken photos of these “macabre scenes” to post on social media to “maintain terror among the population.”

The nongovernmental group showed photos to The Post that it said were sharedby gang members in WhatsApp groups. The images of scattered body parts, decapitated heads and mutilated corpses were forwarded many times on the Meta-owned messaging service.

Analysts said messages from gang members often appear on WhatsApp first and are then spread on other platforms or by mainstream media organizations. WhatsApp’s encrypted chats scramble messages so only the sender and receiver can read them, making it more difficult to detect harmful content unless a user reports it.

Twitter and TikTok said their human content moderators and other tools that detect harmful content cover several languages, but they did not say whether Haitian Creole was among them.

“These social media [companies] need resources affiliated to specific regions and countries,” Rumbold said.

Still, some users are adept at slipping around efforts to block them.

After TikTok removed Izo’s account recently, he posted several Instagram stories to share the news and express his displeasure.

One Instagram story showed a TikTok page — with several of the videos from the deleted one.

“God forbid I had another account,” said the text of the story, with several flexed biceps emoji.

FEAST OF THE MOST HOLY TRINITY (June 12th, 2022)    

Prov. 8, 22-31; Ps. 8; Rom. 5, 1-5; Jn. 16, 12-15

https://youtu.be/Xdjx7cR0DCU

Msgr. Pierre Andre Pierre

https://youtu.be/Xdjx7cR0DCU

In this celebration of the Holy Trinity, we may wonder how and to what extent we can understand this one God with three faces, the Trinity. Our human mind is too small to encompass this great mystery. But the Bible, already in the Old Testament, shows us that wisdom is not mere knowledge, but the art of life, understanding with the heart by reflecting on our vital experience (cf. Prov. 8, 22-31; and Ps. 8). And that experience tells us: God is love, and he comes to us in many ways, with paternal and maternal concern and care, with forgiveness and with the life that Jesus brought us, with courage and joy, hope and light shed on us by the Holy Spirit. May we deepen this experience during every Eucharist.

The Church calls us today to reverently contemplate the awesome mystery of God. Who is He in the reality of his nature, this great “One Whose Mighty Deeds Are Clearly Seen?”

When falling on our knees, we search the Scriptures, especially the texts of the New Testament our understanding of the mystery of God reaches new heights. Jesus himself is described as the Word Made Flesh. And the Word is said to be God himself. Jesus, therefore, is completely God (cf. John 1,1-18).

Jesus, in turn, sends upon us His Spirit, also described as the Spirit of the Most High yet that Spirit is shown as standing as a distinct person. The divinity is not broken down into three parts! The Word and the Spirit possess in full the divinity of the Father. We marvel, therefore at a God at once Three and One” This is what we call the Trinity, three persons equally sharing in Love their very selves: One nature; three persons! We marvel at a Relationship of Love at its Supreme Stage.

These revealed truths open our minds to the vision of a Supreme Father who is not Isolated, closed upon Himself but a Being involved in an overwhelming Love Relationship with the Word. That mutual relationship intense as a flaming fire IS the Holy Spirit who is poured upon us. Our God is a furnace of Love and of Light and of Being embracing all things including ourselves.

The genuine worshiper of this overwhelming Being of Consuming Love is called to be a witness and a promotor of Light, Love, and Truth in this created world. How glorious is our God!

U.S. focuses on U.N. presence in Haiti as it seeks to help troubled country

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES AND NORA GÁMEZ TORRES

UPDATED JUNE 10, 2022 8:30 PM

As Haiti grapples with an unprecedented wave of kidnappings and killings by armed gangs, a top State Department diplomat for Latin America and the Caribbean said Friday the U.S. is actively engaged in discussions about Haiti’s mounting security challenges and what the presence of a United Nations mission in the country should look like. “We’re looking at what the structure of that mission would be going forward and making sure that it is properly equipped to deal with the security issues in Haiti,” Assistant Secretary of State Brian A. Nichols told the Miami Herald in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the Ninth Summit of the Americas. Nichols’ comments are the first public acknowledgment that the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti, known by its French acronym, BINUH, has not worked. The small mission was put in place in October 2019 after the closure of the United Nations Peacekeeping Operation after 15 years.

The closure came amid growing political and security challenges that have many observers believing that Haiti is far worse today than it was in 2004 when the international community agreed to send troops to stabilize the country after its then-president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, fled into exile amid a bloody coup. That reality has led some to agitate for a military presence to help the country’s beleaguered police force take on heavily armed gangs that now control large swaths of the capital and are helping fuel the largest exodus of Haitian boat refugees since 2004. But the U.S., which has framed the country’s current security woes as a policing and not military matter, has resisted any request for outside military assistance for Haiti. U.S. sources at the National Security Council and the U.S. mission at the United Nations told the Herald that there are no active discussions over any plans to send a new peacekeeping force to Haiti. That leaves the current U.N. political mission, which has struggled to help Haiti as it plunges deeper into political instability, human rights abuses and banditry. In October, the U.N. Security Council agreed to extend the U.N. mission by nine months. The decision came after the U.S., which wanted a one-year extension, struck an 11th-hour compromise with China. The Chinese, along with Russia, have been vocal critics of the international community’s presence in Haiti, and had sought to limit the extension to six months. As part of the compromise, the Security Council agreed to an assessment of the U.N. mission. That assessment has been circulated among council members of U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, whose office on Friday also shared its latest report on the situation in Haiti ahead of its meeting in a few weeks to discuss the mission’s future. “Obviously, whatever we do in the international community, it has to support Haitian efforts to build security and to find a negotiated solution and a way forward to re-establish full democracy in Haiti,” Nichols said. Nichols insisted that the U.S. and other partners in the international partners are providing “robust assistance” to the Haiti National Police, particularly in the areas of training and equipping an anti-gang task force and special weapons and tactics units. In meetings with interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry on the sidelines of the summit in Los Angeles, U.S. officials also committed to providing additional police support and to work toward relaxing weapons and arms requirements. Haiti is subjected to a U.S. arms embargo that has not prevented gangs from being heavily armed, but has prevented the police from being properly equipped to confront them.

Read Next: As desperate Haitians take to the sea, they turn to Vodou to help guide their journeys So far, however, the United States’ offerings have yet to bear fruit, leaving the population to struggle under a wave of unabated kidnappings. U.N. agencies recently reported that in May alone there were at least 200 kidnappings and in recent days, a number of foreign citizens have been kidnapped, including three U.N. employees. One of the employees has been identified by several sources as driver for the head of the U.N. office, Helen La Lime.

Stéphane Dujarric, the spokesperson for Guterres, told the Herald Friday that the U.N. staffer who was taken hostage May 23 “was released in good health” Thursday. “The United Nations remains mobilized with the support of the national authorities for the resolution of two further cases,” he said, without offering details. Two Belgium citizens were also grabbed in front of a building in Petionville where foreign diplomats also live. All of this has created anxiety and helplessness among other foreign citizens and Haitian nationals, and fueled a sense of exasperation among an increasingly frustrated foreign diplomatic corps. With no higher travel warning than No. 4, which is “Do Not Travel,” both the U.S. and France last year told their citizens living in Haiti to leave. France did so after the still unsolved assassination of the country’s president, Jovenel Moïse, and the U.S. did so after gangs blocked the entrance to ports that hold fuel and brought the country to a halt. “We recognize that the situation for average Haitians, it is deeply worrisome with regard to security, and kidnapping and crime remains at alarming levels,” Nichols said. “And we in the international community have to do more and better to support the Haitian people.”

Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry speaks during a plenary session at the Summit of the Americas, Friday, June 10, 2022, in Los Angeles. Marcio Jose Sanchez AP On Thursday, Nichols met with interim Prime Minister Henry. On Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken joined the foreign ministers of Canada and Mexico to discuss the situation in Haiti. There will also soon be another donors meeting — the fourth in less than a year — on Haiti, Nichols said.

“We’re not going to stop until we give the Haitian people the better future that they deserve,” he said. But how the U.S. should go about that has been a point of contention. Members of civil society in Haiti known as the Montana Group and their supporters in the U.S. Congress have been urging the Biden administration to end its support for Henry and allow a new group of mostly non-political actors to take charge of the country. Instead, the U.S. has asked both sides to reach an agreement to come up with “a Haitian-led solution.” With neither Henry nor the Montana Group, named after an accord it signed at the Montana Hotel, seemingly willing to share power, both sides have remained at loggerheads as the international community pushes for dialogue. The political paralysis, coupled with the social tensions and deepening sense of despair, have all led to large migration flows of Haitians throughout the hemisphere. Nichols Friday continued to insist on the need for a compromise, saying that the U.S. has encouraged Henry and civil society groups, “particularly the Montana group, to come together and select counselors as a way to prepare for elections so that the international community can support with technical assistance, financial resources, and make sure that preparations can take place in a secure environment and candidates can compete without fear and that voters can go to the polls in a peaceful way.”

McClatchy Senior National Security Correspondent Michael Wilner contributed to this report. This story was originally published June 10, 2022 7:22 PM.

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/haiti/article262402162.html

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 8 juin 2022

 Miami fires manager of Little Haiti Cultural Center for second time in six years
Miami City Manager Art Noriega has fired Sandy Dorsainvil, the manager of the Little Haiti Cultural Center.
The dismissal — the second time in six years that a top administrator has fired Dorsainvil — ends what has been a tumultuous relationship between the city government and the director of a cultural hub that hosts the Caribbean Marketplace, a fine art gallery and a theater.
Noriega signed her termination letter May 27, catching Dorsainvil by surprise because she had decided to resign weeks earlier amid tensions with city management. Internal emails show Dorsainvil had verbally resigned May 10 during an “emotional” meeting with management, but she later tried to rescind her comments after consulting with her employee union. After more disagreement with the city, Dorsainvil decided to maintain her resignation.
The night before she was fired, the center had held a farewell for Dorsainvil at the opening of an art exhibit, Bèl Fanm . She was let go less than a week before her last day.
In his letter, Noriega wrote that Dorsainvil was insubordinate and broke several city rules leading up a five-day suspension in mid-May, during which he said she violated policies again by sending emails from her work account. The city manager wrote that in April and May, Dorsainvil had improperly signed off on a city contract and violated city purchasing policies when she spent $2,000 on an electronic billboard to promote Haitian Heritage Month without necessary approvals.
On Thursday, Dorsainvil told the Miami Herald she acknowledges that paperwork should’ve been done correctly and city processes should’ve been followed, but the cultural center was too understaffed for her to get work done without breaking some rules.
“I know I’m not perfect,” Dorsainvil said. “But what I can say with 100% certainty is the errors that occurred were because I am one person. I did not have the staff to accomplish what they wanted accomplished the way they wanted it done.”
The fired manager of the Haitian Cultural Center, Sandy Dorsainvil Haitian Cultural Center
Dorsainvil said she does not plan to contest her firing. She had managed the cultural center since May 2013, with a break after the first time she was fired.
In April 2016, Dorsainvil was suddenly fired when her boss suspected she was embezzling money. Her firing caused an uproar among her supporters in Miami’s Haitian community, and it led some commissioners to unsuccessfully push for the firing of Daniel Alfonso, the city manager at the time.
A three-year inquiry led to no charges after investigators found no evidence that Dorsainvil had stolen or diverted any money from the facility. She was later reinstated.
The latest firing came a week after controversy over a planned musical performance by former Haitian President Michel Martelly, also known as “Sweet Micky,” at the cultural center. Activists in Miami’s Haitian community decried Martelly and planned to protest the May 25 event. Martelly has faced accusations of corruption since leaving office, and his political party has been blamed for political unrest and increasing gang violence in Haiti.
Miami police barred Martelly from performing , citing safety concerns. In 2018, Dorsainvil defended a decision to invite Martelly to perform in Little Haiti.
Noriega’s letter did not mention Martelly, and Dorsainvil said she didn’t think her dismissal had anything to do with the concert. She suggested that she and the city did not see eye to eye on how to properly support the cultural center.
“The goal is not for the center to succeed. I don’t know what the goal is, but all of the dots don’t align,” Dorsainvil said. “If you want a public facility to succeed, you give it the staff it needs, the resources it needs.”
Residents participate in Afro-dances during a Fèt Chanpèt event at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex on Saturday, Aug. 14, 2021. Devoun Cetoute/Miami Herald file photo

https://insightcrime.org/news/haiti-gangs-recruiting-arming-more-children/
Haiti Gangs Recruiting, Arming More Children
CARIBBEAN / 3 JUN 2022 BY ALESSANDRO FORD EN
Gangs in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince are rounding up homeless and at-risk teens, who are increasingly being used as foot soldiers in gang wars that have forced schools to close and engulfed neighborhoods.
Homeless minors are disappearing from streets and shelters as armed groups recruit them with offers of money and security. One shelter near the National Palace was down to nearly 10 percent capacity, having been targeted by the Ti Lapli, Bougoy and 100 Jours gangs, reported Spanish news agency EFE on May 30.
The child recruitment reports come just weeks after United Nations (UN) High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet expressed alarm at the extreme gang violence in Port-au-Prince, which has caused thousands of families to flee. The UN noted in a news release the gangs were using minors as combatants and killing them for being informants to rivals. The gangs are also imposing control through sexual violence, including raping children as young as ten.
By early May, gang violence forced the closure of almost 1,700 schools and deprived half a million children of access to education, according to UNICEF, the UN’s children’s rights body.
“Giving children weapons to fight and using them as soldiers or spies is a violation of their child rights and condemned by both national and international laws,” Bruno Maes, UNICEF Representative in Haiti, said in the news release.
Gangs arming children in Haiti drew attention in early April, when a videocirculated on social media of a boy carrying an M4 rifle. In the video, the boy proclaims his gang membership while wielding the firearm. The video was shot in the fiercely contested neighborhood of Martissant, at the capital's southern entrance.
InSight Crime Analysis
In Haiti – as in countries like Colombia, Argentina and Mexico – urban gangs have long used minors in supporting roles, such as lookouts and couriers for arms or drugs. But escalating gang warfare in Haiti's capital has led youths to be press-ganged and recruited for street battles.
Child recruitment in Haiti first became visible in the early 2000s, when the country’s fledgling gangs took advantage of political and economic chaos to recruit vulnerable children. The gangs offered them food and safety, according to a 2008 report by the non-governmental organization Child Soldiers International.
In return, notes the report, the children served as messengers, watched over kidnap victims and even conducted sabotage missions against UN peacekeepers, such as one case in which very young children cut the brake cables of UN tanks during an operation to arrest gang leaders.
Child combatants existed, but they were relatively rare. Previously, many gang leaders in Martissant would not even allow young children to hang around their soldiers, said Eric Calpas, a researcher who has studied gangs in Haiti. Around 2018, when sporadic gang violence escalated into a criminal war in Port-au-Prince, Haiti began to see a significant increase in minors equipped with firearms.
“Today, because of the war situation … they are forced to recruit really broadly: adults and teenagers and children as young as 10 to 12 years old,” Calpas said.
Two hotspots for child recruitment have been the battleground districts of Martissant and Croix-des-Bouquets, where conflicts have raged since mid-2021. According to Calpas, Haiti’s most notorious gang, 400 Mawozo, is the worst offender, relying on intimidation to force minors into its ranks as it wages an expansionist campaign across the capital's northern areas.
However, the majority of underage recruits join willingly, says Calpas, seeking emotional belonging as much as food and shelter. In this, they resemble more the child aspirants of Central American street gangs like the MS13 than the often forced conscripts of Colombia’s rural armed groups.
Certain Haitian gang leaders today began as child recruits, notes Calpas, mirroring many of their Central American counterparts.

Joseph Alfred via groups.io <joe_alfred=Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser.>;

sam. 4 juin 22:22 (il y a 12 heures)

The next government of Haiti shall use this documented article from a prestigious US media to launch a lawsuit against the United States and France.
Where is the Haitian Diaspora? The Haitian Diaspora could have been more useful to Haiti if it was organized.
There is a case !!! against France and the United States. Also, the former US president confessed and there should be compensation.
Make sure you know the moral character of the people you are dealing with in Haiti and the Diaspora.
It is fair game to use your own words against you in due time.
My Dad and Mom taught me this: if someone is not going to be useful to me or has nothing to gain from my success in my future, drop that person. I follow their advice religiously. I help you, you help me. It is not going to be one way !!!
Peace !!!

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 27 mai 2022

 US Approves Resumption of Operations in Venezuela For US, European Oil Companies

The United States has allowed US and European oil companies to resume work in Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, the vice president of Venezuela, said on Tuesday.

"The Bolivarian government of Venezuela has verified and confirmed the published news that the United States of America has authorized American and European oil companies to negotiate and resume operations in Venezuela," Rodriguez tweeted.

US officials told reporters that if progress is made, there may be an opportunity for US engagement with the government of Nicolás Maduro.

It has also been said that the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and the opposition will soon resume a political dialogue and, depending on the results, Washington could adjust its sanction policy in order to increase or decrease pressure.

Earlier, it was reported that the US had decided to resume negotiations with Venezuela amid the strict sanctions imposed on Russian energy suppliers. In March, both sides discussed the possibility of easing oil sanctions against Caracas but failed to make significant progress.

Washington introduced the first package of restrictions against Venezuela in 2015, citing “human rights violations.” The sanctions were extended after the presidential elections that took place in 2019. The US, along with a number of other Western countries, didn’t recognize the reelection of President Nicolás Maduro and endorsed Juan Guaido, head of the opposition-controlled National Assembly, as "interim head of state."

JetBlue makes hostile bid for Spirit. Flight attendants’ union favors Spirit-Frontier merger

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Updated May 17, 2022 5:04 PM

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JetBlue made a second unsolicited bid to acquire South Florida-based Spirit Airlines on Monday, May 16, 2022, in an attempt to stop Spirit’s merger with Frontier Airlines. GERMÁN GUERRA EL NUEVO HERALD

JetBlue Airways is not taking no for an answer from Spirit Airlines, now making a hostile tender offer directly to Spirit’s shareholders. 

New York-based JetBlue on Monday made its second unsolicited bid to acquire Spirit and thwart its planned merger with rival ultra-low fare carrier Frontier Airlines of Denver. Spirit said in a statement it would review JetBlue’s new offer, which is required by its fiduciary responsibility to shareholders.

Miramar-based Spirit employs 3,400 people in South Florida and is the largest carrier at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

JetBlue’s latest move is a hostile attempt to get Spirit’s stockholders to sell their stock for $30 a share in cash (a little more than $3.2 billion), and that would increase to its original offer of $33 a share if Spirit’s management and board cooperates. 

The bid comes two weeks after Spirit announced its board rejected JetBlue’s offer and intended to go ahead to combine with Frontier to create the nation’s fifth-largest airline. In February, Spirit and Frontier announced they would merge, seeking to bring their cheap passenger fares from coast to coast.

Spirit has set a June 10 shareholder vote on its merger with Frontier and urged shareholders to approve the deal. JetBlue filed a proxy statement Monday to urge Spirit shareholders to “vote no” against the Spirit-Frontier union, calling the $2.9 billion cash-and-stock deal, “inferior, high risk and low value.”

“Given the Spirit Board of Directors’ complete unwillingness to share the same necessary diligence information that was shared with Frontier, JetBlue is now offering to acquire Spirit for $30 per share in cash through a fully financed tender offer,” JetBlue said in a statement, noting that its offer is a 60% higher premium than Frontier’s. “JetBlue is fully prepared to negotiate in good faith a consensual transaction at $33, subject to receiving necessary diligence.”

The Association of Flight Attendants, a national union which represents flight attendants from Spirit and Frontier, on Tuesday voiced support for the combination and said the union had reached a merger transition agreement with Frontier Holdings. Frontier would be the majority shareholder if the marriage with Spirit is completed.

Pilot and flight attendants’ unions play key roles in the aviation workforce. Airline industry analysts say that union negotiations and merging staffs with their seniority lists are among the most arduous parts of airline mergers and acquisitions. 

“We are thrilled to announce our support for the merger of Spirit and Frontier Airlines after reaching a transition agreement that protects flight attendant jobs, assists with the AFA-CWA seniority integration that protects the bidding seniority each flight attendant has accrued prior to the merger, and paves the way for efficient contract bargaining that allows flight attendants to experience the benefits of the merger as soon as possible,” Sara Nelson, the president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, said in a statement. 

Early this month, JetBlue said it also was offering Spirit a $200 million break-up fee, if federal regulators would block its acquisition of the Broward County airline due to antitrust reasons. Ultimately, federal regulators would have to approve any deal Spirit and an airline partner agreed on. That evaluation would take at least 18 to 24 months.

Spirit and Frontier share a similar deep discount business model and have had overlapping executives and investors. Indigo Partners, a private equity group, first owned a controlling share of Spirit from 2006 to 2013, before selling its interest and buying the majority of Frontier. Last year, Indigo took Frontier public, selling shares to investors. 

Frontier CEO Barry Biffle was Spirit’s chief marketing officer from 2008 to 2016. The co-founder of Indigo is chairman of Frontier’s board of directors, and some of Spirit’s directors have ties to Indigo. In a letter to Spirit’s shareholders, JetBlue claimed the “longstanding relationships” between Spirit and Indigo are why Spirit won’t engage in talks about a deal with JetBlue.

Airline industry analysts have said Spirit and Frontier have long been likely candidates for a merger, while JetBlue’s original bid in April for Spirit was a surprise.

Spirit’s stock jumped $2.31 a share Monday on takeover speculation, closing at $19.27. Frontier’s stock added $.51, closing at $9.23, while JetBlue shares fell $.61 to $9.45.

This story was originally published  May 16, 2022 5:43 PM.

From The Weekly Bulletin of The National Center of The Haitian Apostolate

                                                           22 Mai , 2022

REFLECTIONS ON THE READINGS OF THE 6TH SUNDAY OF EASTER - May 22, 2022

https://youtu.be/ZkI_QTF8b8g

Acts 15, 1-2 + 22-29; Psalm 67; Revelations 21, 10-14 + 22-23; John 14, 23-29 

Msgr. Pierre André Pierre

From time to time we hear that an old woman or an old man, aware that death is not far away, gives advice to his sons and daughters: “When I am gone, do this or that for your own good and happiness. Jesus' parting words are also addressed to us; they are like a kind of last will and testament. Jesus is telling us that if we want find that elusive true peace that only he can give, we have to love him and the Father, and also love one another. We have to keep listening to the Holy Spirit who reminds us of his works and teachings.

This Sunday announces two great feasts that we shall be celebrating shortly: that of the glorious Ascension of the Lord next Thursday and that of Pentecost in two weeks. Both of these feasts cast tremendous lights on the Mystery of Christ.

First Jesus having laid the foundation of his Church and having performed on Calvary his mission of reconciling us to the Father tells his apostles: “I am going away and will come back to you.” Yes, he can go now for He has equipped the Church with the ability to know and preserve the truth and to dispense his grace. He vested the Apostles with authority telling them: “He who listens to you listens to me.” The glorious feast of the Ascension marks a turning point in the history of Salvation, the day when Jesus turns over his mission to the Apostles and when Peter assumes the power of the keys. “And I will be with you always until the end of time.”

Ten days later, we will celebrate the incredible feast of the Gift that is the feast of Pentecost. Love remains the first commandment…that special love that has its primary source in God himself. It is that supreme power of Love that will be poured out upon all who keep Jesus’ Word. All who receive the gift remain linked between themselves to prepare that day still in the future as described in the second reading of the day when the Church is described as it will be at the end of time. It will be like a Holy City gleaming with the radiance of God and will have at its foundation the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

Then there will be no sun and no light for The City’s lamp will be the Lamb. These great feasts awaken us to the great future of mankind if only we learn to “Keep the Word” and be faithful members of One Body!Dropping anchor

My aunt called me the other day to urge me to repent, for the world seems to be coming to an end. “The Rapture is upon us,” she said with a tint of apprehension in her voice. With everything going on in the world, “moun domi ak on je fèmen, on je louvri,” she continued. It had been a while since I saw my aunt so worried. She is usually unfazed by the comings and goings of people and things. She is a believer of God whom she thinks is the master of all things. Therefore, all she must do is surrender. Long before the mindfulness craze swept across the Western world, my aunt created her version of dropping anchor which consists of singing hymns, kneeling, and praying steadfastly when difficult situations arise and unleash feelings of anxiety and hopelessness.  And there have been quite a few of those senseless situations that uncork overwhelming grief and powerlessness. She likes to think of herself as a mother of eight (5 living, 2 deceased, 1 adopted), a wife, a Christian, a businesswoman, and a die-hard Haitian. I always smile when she says with conviction “lakay se lakay, peyi blan pa peyi w.”

I do agree with my dear aunt that the times we live in are daunting. As we speak, Covid is still a thing, and a new Monkey virus that is usually endemic in West Africa is now spreading to other countries in Europe, the United States, and Canada. When the breaking news are not about the war in Ukraine, they are about hate crime, bigotry, inflation, extreme weather, or celebrities throwing tantrums. I wish there were a lakay I could return to, but unfortunately the lakay I fantasize about no longer exists. Haitians are escaping in droves. I like to think of home/lakay as the vertical time and space I inhabit where the simple things in life are readily available: fresh air, trees, laughter, incandescent sunsets, bike trails, books, coffee, and my old couch. Home is also immaterial. It is the cultural makeup from which stem my longing for true connections and my love of simple pleasures, art, and beauty. I was listening to Paul Beaubrun and Anie Alerte’s interpretation of Ayizan, and I was brought home. In my body. My senses. The Here and the Now. This is all there is.

https://youtu.be/JRfZdFwSQtM

This reminds me of Derek Walcott’s Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

D.W

Pascale Doresca
5/21/2022