Thanks for sharing that piece of information. Given the number of groups
that continue to travel to Haiti I suspect many would agree with that
assessment. The question is how can we help overcome that image. It
sounds like the Haitians need a good public relations firm.

Mike

Pix Mahler wrote:
> Haiti's image of fear 'a big myth' to some
>
>
> March 4, 2008
>
>
> By Reed Lindsay - PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti —
>
> U.N. peacekeepers in Haiti say they are battling an image of fear
> that is keeping the Caribbean nation mired in hunger and disease,
> with little hope of attracting foreign visitors and investment.
>
> Forbes magazine has named Haiti one of the world's 10 most dangerous
> destinations, along with Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia.
>
> The Associated Press has called Port-au-Prince the kidnapping capital
> of the Americas.
>
> The U.S. government maintains a perpetual travel warning on Haiti,
> while diplomats, journalists and aid workers spend much of their time
> holed up in fortified hotels.
>
> The image stems largely from two violent years after the 2004 U.S.
> ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide when the slums of Port-au-
> Prince erupted in gunbattles between gangs, Haitian police and U.N.
> peacekeepers, plus a wave of kidnappings.
>
> Today, Haiti's reputation is undeserved, say security analysts and
> officials from the U.N. peacekeeping mission. They argue that Haiti
> is no more violent than any other Latin American country.
>
> "It's a big myth," said Fred Blaise, spokesman for the U.N. police
> force in Haiti. "Port-au-Prince is no more dangerous than any big
> city. You can go to New York and get pickpocketed and held at gunpoint."
>
> Reliable statistics are scarce in Haiti, but U.N. data indicate that
> the country could be among the safest in the region.
>
> The U.N. peacekeeping mission recorded 487 homicides in Haiti last
> year, or about 5.6 per 100,000 people.
>
> A U.N.-World Bank study last year estimated the Caribbean's average
> homicide rate at 30 per 100,000, with Jamaica registering nearly nine
> times as many — 49 homicides per 100,000 people — as those recorded
> by the United Nations in Haiti.
>
> In 2006, the neighboring Dominican Republic notched more than four
> times more homicides per capita than those registered in Haiti: 23.6
> per 100,000, according to the Central American Observatory on Violence.
>
> Even the United States would appear to have a higher homicide rate:
> 5.7 per 100,000 in 2006, according to the U.S. Justice Department.
>
> "There is not a large amount of violence [in Haiti]," said Gen. Jose
> Elito Carvalho Siquiera, the former Brazilian commander of the U.N.
> military force in Haiti. "If you compare the levels of poverty here
> with those of Sao Paolo [Brazil] or other cities, there is more
> violence there than here."
>
> The U.N. peacekeeping mission, known as Minustah, arrived in Haiti in
> June 2004, three months after U.S. troops whisked Mr. Aristide into
> exile amid an armed rebellion.
>
> The U.S.-backed interim government then waged a campaign against Mr.
> Aristide's supporters, igniting two years of gunfights in Port-au-
> Prince's slums.
>
> A wave of kidnappings also swept panic through the capital. From 2005
> until 2006, Minustah registered 1,356 kidnappings.
>
> Kidnappings have become common in many Latin American countries, but
> were rare in Haiti before Mr. Aristide's ouster.
>
> "The kidnappings shocked everyone because they hadn't happened in the
> past," said Mr. Blaise, the U.N. police spokesman. "Still, when you
> compare the number of kidnappings here, I don't think it's more than
> anywhere else."
>
> Security improved markedly last year. The number of kidnappings
> dropped by nearly 70 percent, and the U.N. peacekeeping mission
> wrested control of Port-au-Prince's battle-torn slums from armed groups.
>
> President Rene Preval, elected in a landslide in February 2006, has
> mollified Haiti's political opposition.
>
> Gunshots are now seldom heard in Port-au-Prince. Violent crime in the
> countryside has always been rare. Attacks on foreigners are few and
> far between, and in recent months American Airlines flights from
> Miami to the capital have been packed with Christian missionaries and
> aid workers.
>
> Even when the instability was at its peak, observers say, violence
> usually was limited to a few Port-au-Prince slums.
>
> "If you compare Haiti to Iraq, to Afghanistan, to Rwanda, we don't
> even appear on the same scale," said Patrick Elie, who heads a
> government commission studying the creation of a new security force.
>
> "We've had a tumultuous history, that is true, one characterized by
> political instability," said Mr. Elie. "But except for the war that
> we had to wage to obtain our freedom and independence from the
> French, Haiti has never known a level of violence comparable to that
> which has been waged in Europe, in America and the European countries
> in Africa and Asia. Our country has been one of the least violent."
>
> Viva Rio, a Brazilian-based violence reduction group that came to
> Haiti at the request of the U.N. mission's disarmament program, has
> found Port-au-Prince's armed groups more receptive than those in Rio
> de Janeiro's slums.
>
> Last March, the organization persuaded warring gangs in Bel Air and
> neighboring downtown slums to sign a peace treaty, in which they
> swore to abstain from violence in exchange for youth scholarships.
> Since then, the area has been peaceful.
>
> "This would be unthinkable in Rio," said Rubem Cesar Fernandes, Viva
> Rio's director.
>
> The humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders classified the
> "raging violence" in Port-au-Prince as one of the world's 10 most
> underreported stories in 2006. Even then, only one of every 10
> patients at its trauma hospital was the victim of a bullet wound.
> Most had been injured in car crashes and domestic accidents.
>
> "It's not the insecurity, not the bullets, not the conflict between
> gangs and police," said Yann Libessart, the former head of the
> Doctors Without Borders mission. "What's killing people in Haiti is
> not being able to give birth to a baby in a hospital or not having
> access to medical care because they don't have enough money to pay."
>
> While the international community has made security the priority, the
> dominant concern for most poor Haitians is the rising cost of food.
> The prices of staples such as rice and beans have nearly doubled in
> the past three years, a devastating trend in a country where about 80
> percent of the population earns less than $2 a day.
>
> "Our problem isn't violence," said Yvner Meneide, an artisan living
> in downtown Port-au-Prince. "If we were violent, we would organize
> demonstrations every day, we would be destroying things. But the
> Haitian people are very moderate. We might be hungry, but we are calm."
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________
>
> Forwarded as a service of the Haiti Support Group - solidarity with
> the Haitian people's struggle for human rights, participatory
> democracy and equitable development - since 1992.
>
> Web site: www.haitisupport.gn.apc.org
>
>
>
>
>
> Pix Mahler
> pix@...
> http://www.pcusa.org/missionconnections/profiles/mahlerp.htm
> PCUSA Haiti Partnership Facilitator
> 1022 Floyd St.
> Lynchburg, VA 24501
> 434-385-9486
>
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>

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