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UN special envoy to Haiti Bill Clinton greets US Military upon arrival at Port-au-Prince - Source: Reuters -
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Former US President Bill Clinton urged the US and Haitian
governments to resolve the case of 10 American missionaries accused
of trying to take children illegally out of quake-hit Haiti.
Clinton, named by the United Nations to coordinate relief efforts
for survivors of the devastating January 12 quake, made the appeal
during a visit to the shattered Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince,
his second since last month's disaster.
The accused US missionaries, most of who belong to an Idaho-based
Baptist church, were arrested a week ago and charged with child
kidnapping and criminal association.
Haitian authorities say the group tried to take a busload of 33
Haitian children across the border into the Dominican Republic
without any papers proving the minors were orphans or any official
permission to take them out of the country.
The missionaries deny any intentional wrongdoing and say they were
only trying to help children left destitute by the January 12
earthquake, which killed more than 200,000 people, injured some
300,000 and left over a million more homeless.
The Americans' case is diplomatically sensitive and aid groups
complain it has distracted media and world attention away from the
struggle to feed and shelter hundreds of thousands of Haitians
camped out in wrecked streets.
"What's important now is for the government of Haiti and the
government of the United States to get together and work through
this," Clinton told CNN in Port-au-Prince.
He said he understood the Haitian government's efforts to try to
protect its children from possible child traffickers and unlawful
adoptions following the catastrophic quake.
But he also said the missionaries could be telling the truth when
they argued they simply wanted to help the children and did not
mean to violate any laws.
Evidence has emerged that many of the intercepted children were
not orphans but were given up by parents who wanted them to have a
better life.
"The government of Haiti ... (is) not looking for some big fight
here. They just want to protect their children and they also want
to make sure they have a good inventory so they don't send children
away that maybe have an aunt or an uncle that have an income,"
Clinton said.
"I think they'll find a way to defuse the crisis and work through
this," he added, but he said the case was not his direct
responsibility.
The missionaries, five men and five women, were questioned
individually on Friday by investigating Judge Bernard Sainvil at
the offices of the prosecutor in the city.
Officials said the judge would continue his investigation next
Monday and Tuesday, before making a decision on whether to release
the 10 or proceed with the case against them.
Washington monitoring, not interfering
The missionaries' lawyer, Edwin Coq, said he had requested the 10
be released provisionally pending the further hearings, but no
decision was immediately taken on that.
Coq said the Americans, who had been held at police headquarters up
to now, were taken after the questioning on Friday to established
prisons - the women to a women's prison in the Petionville suburb
and the men to the quake-damaged central prison in the
capital.
The US government, which is spearheading the big relief operation
in Haiti, has said it is providing the Americans with consular
access and monitoring their case, but it has made clear it does not
want to interfere.
"Obviously this is a matter for the Haitian judicial system,"
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who is Bill Clinton's wife,
told reporters in Washington.
Haitian President Rene Preval's crippled administration, which has
been accused by many of its citizens of failing to do enough to
help quake survivors, has defended its decision to detain and
charge the Americans.
"It is true the country has been brought to its knees by the
earthquake, but we still have laws. ... In any case, whoever
violates the law has to be sanctioned, whether the violator is a US
or European citizen, or someone else," Justice Minister Paul Denis
said.
The detained Americans were still hoping on Friday they would
eventually be released.
"We pray to God for the outcome," said the group's leader, Laura
Silsby.
Another member of the group, which called itself the New Life
Children's Refuge and planned to build an orphanage in the
Dominican Republic for the Haitian children, said it was
unfortunate that world attention was focusing on their case and not
the plight of Haiti's earthquake victims.
"I think the most important thing is to continue to put the focus
on the people, the kids who are suffering, because they need help.
That's the reason why we were here in the first place, to help,"
Silas Daniel Thompson, 19, said while he was being taken to see the
investigating judge.
Haiti's government has tightened adoption procedures since the
quake, saying it feared unscrupulous traffickers could try to take
advantage of the disaster by spiriting away vulnerable
children.
Officials said they already had reports of trafficking of minors, and even of human organs.
