(RSF/IFEX) – The following is an RSF press release: “Who killed Jean Dominique ?” 3 April 2000 – 3 April 2001 “If they murdered him, they can murder any journalist” A year after the killing on 3 April 2000 of the well-known Haitian journalist Jean Dominique, Reporters Sans Frontières (Reporters Without Borders – RSF) publishes […]
(RSF/IFEX) – The following is an RSF press release:
“Who killed Jean Dominique ?”
3 April 2000 – 3 April 2001
“If they murdered him, they can murder any journalist”
A year after the killing on 3 April 2000 of the well-known Haitian journalist Jean Dominique, Reporters Sans Frontières (Reporters Without Borders – RSF) publishes a report on the murder inquiry and the many obstacles it has encountered. RSF visited Haiti from 19-25 March 2001.
The murder enquiry was nearly cut short several times :
– Jean-Wilner Lalanne, a suspected link-man between those who ordered the killing and the gunmen who carried it out, died after a minor operation in hospital. His body had disappeared from the morgue when investigators wanted to do a second autopsy.
– The Haitian Senate refused for several weeks to allow an examining magistrate to question Sen. Dany Toussaint about the killing. Jean Dominique had attacked Toussaint’s “ambitions.” The Senate cited rules of parliamentary immunity.
– The investigators have been threatened and intimidated. The first examining magistrate in the case, Judge Jean Sénat Fleury, resigned after five months.
RSF fears that the inquiry will run into new obstacles and considers that its success depends greatly on the determination of the government to see it through to the end. The attitude of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s government will be a pointer to its interest in defending press freedom and combating impunity in a country that has seen a dozen political killings in the past two years.
RSF’s report calls on President Aristide’s government to increase the funding, equipment and other means at the enquiry’s disposal, on parliament to respect the independence of the country’s courts and judges, and on the government to carry out the decisions of the judiciary, regardless of who those decisions apply to. It also asks the Organisation of American States, the European Union, the International Organisation for the Francophonie and the United Nations Independent Expert on Haiti to pay special attention to the case.
Jean Dominique, Haiti’s best-known journalist and political commentator, was gunned down in the courtyard of his radio station, Haiti Inter. Some 16,000 people attended his funeral in the national stadium. President René Préval ordered three days of official mourning. Since then, a foundation has been set up (Fondasyon Eko Vwa Jean Dominique) to ensure that those who killed him are punished and that his commitment to mass education is continued.
“If they murdered him, they can murder any journalist,” says Liliane Pierre-Paul, a former Radio Haiti Inter journalist who now runs Radio Kiskeya. Haitian journalists, deeply shocked by the murder, have taken it as a warning to the entire press.
A fighter for democracy, Dominique was twice forced into exile abroad – in 1981 under the Duvalier dictatorship and in 1991 when the army took power.
He was famous for his independent spirit and harshly criticised the country’s moneyed elite, the former Duvalierists, the army, and most recently, certain figures in Aristide’s Fanmi Lavalas party who he suspected of wanting to “turn the party away from its ideals.”
The report is available in French, English and Spanish on the RSF website: www.rsf.fr
