You cannot kill the truth - the case against Jean-Claude Duvalier

Amnesty International 2011, englisch, 34 Seiten

After 25 years in exile, former dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier returned to Haiti in January 2011. Within days, survivors of human rights violations and the families of victims of his regime filed complaints of torture, arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance carried out by the Haitian authorities between 1971 and 1986. An investigation into serious human rights violations was opened, and Jean-Claude Duvalier was indicted for crimes against humanity perpetrated by the police, military and National Security Volunteers, also known as tonton macoutes, all of whom were under his command when the crimes were carried out.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Amnesty International documented the systematic use of torture, arbitrary arrests, incommunicado detention, enforced disappearance and extrajudicial executions against alleged government opponents in Haiti. This report makes public once again the testimonies and other evidence gathered by Amnesty International during Jean-Claude Duvalier's regime, demonstrating that these violations were widespread and systematic and therefore amount to crimes against humanity.

During Jean-Claude Duvalier's years in exile, his victims and their families have not forgotten the abuses perpetrated against them. Their fight for truth, justice and reparation continues, and the Haitian government has an obligation to bring to justice all those responsible, including the former president.