[Peace] Haiti Journalists Kevin Pina and Jean Ristil released

[Gabriel Stanton]

http://www.haitiaction.org/News/IJDH/9_12_5.html

Haiti journalists Kevin Pina and Jean Ristil released
from jail after 
international campaign to protest arrests

On Friday, September 9, American journalist Kevin Pina
was arrested in 
Haiti, because he insisted on filming a search at the
church of political 
prisoner Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste. A Haitian journalist,
Jean Ristil, was 
arrested because he photographed Pina's arrest. Both
spent the weekend in 
prison (articles about their arrests are below).

Thanks to a mobilization in Haiti, the US and
throughout the world, 
pressure was put on the Haitian government to stop
this political 
persecution. Thanks to attorney Mario Joseph of the
Bureau des Avocats 
Internationaux, who represented Pina and Ristil, Judge
Jean Paul Peres has 
released both journalists, with no further charges
against them. Ristil was 
released early Monday, Pina was subjected to 3 and 1/2
hours of 
interrogation, and released just after 5 PM Haiti
time.

We will have more on this in tomorrow's action alert,
including, we hope, 
an account by Pina of the conditions in the prison
that he has left behind, 
but which are still filled with people who have not
been charged with any 
crime.

The Bureau des Avocats Internationaux urgently needs
financial support, so 
that it can continue to represent political prisoners
like Ristil, Pina, 
and Rev. Gerard Jean-Juste, and the families of those
killed by police and 
death squads. Please send contributions to the
Institute for Justice & 
Democracy in Haiti, Box 806, Key Biscayne, FL 33149.

You may also donate on IJDH's website,
<http://www.ijdh.org>www.ijdh.org, 
although the website is down and we do not expect it
to be working until 
Wednesday.

-- Report from the Institute for Justice & Democracy
in Haiti

Also see
http://www.haitiaction.org/News/HIP/9_9_5/9_9_5.html
for story on 


		
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