No support for Aristide's extradition
Stabroek News
April 3, 2004
Neither Caricom nor the Guyana government will support Haiti's former president Jean Bertrand Aristide being extradited back to Haiti as is being requested by Gerard Latortue the country's interim prime minister.
Aristide is presently a guest of the government of Jamaica pending his move to South Africa where he has been granted asylum.
President Bharrat Jagdeo told the press yesterday that the mandate of the interim administration in Haiti is to return it as quickly as possible to democratic rule.
Jagdeo said that the interim administration has made many statements with which he disagreed among which were proposals by the Interior Minister to include the rebels in the Police Force and to set up a committee to look at the resuscitation of the Haitian army which are not matters for any interim administration.
He thought "if that request were to come to Caricom that's how it would be treated. Of course, Jamaica is a sovereign country and Jamaica is free to decide what it wants to do."
However, he said that on this matter "I would not support any such call."
Earlier Jagdeo said that the Caricom leaders did not find it possible to receive Latortue at their just concluded meeting in St Kitts despite the receipt of a letter from him and he would be so informed by the new Caricom chairman, Antigua's Prime Minister, Baldwin Spencer. He said the heads have set a number of pre-conditions and once these have been met they would review the position and decide on the way forward when they meet in an annual conference in July in Grenada.
President Jagdeo said too that there was nothing that the Caricom leaders have seen or heard that would lead to a change in its decision that President Aristide had been forcibly removed from office and that there should be an investigation into the events surrounding his removal.
He re-affirmed that Haiti is still a member of the Caribbean Community and that a task force is being created to co-ordinate Caricom's assistance to the Haitian people as a commitment to them still remains very strong. He said that the task force would work very closely with the special envoy who would be working closely with the core group of Heads of Government to advance the cause of Haiti within the international community.
He added that there would be ongoing contact with the Special Adviser to the United Nations who was present in St Kitts for dialogue with regional leaders.