Ex-dictator ‘Baby Doc’ Duvalier taken to court

AFP/Port-au-Prince

Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc” Duvalier is escorted yesterday by police in the Karibe Hotel in Port-au-Prince. Police took Duvalier from his hotel and headed to the prosecutor’s office

Haitian officials yesterday whisked former dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc” Duvalier away to court, two days after his surprise return from exile stunned the nation he ruled with an iron fist.

After intense questioning lasting well over an hour by the nation’s chief prosecutor and a judge, Duvalier was escorted by police out of the luxury hotel where he had been holed up since he returned late Sunday.

Human rights groups have long pressed for Duvalier to face justice over the alleged torture and killings committed during his 15-year rule, but officials declined to say what charges he might face.

"He is being taken to the prosecutors’ office to notify him of the file against him,” the head of the Port-au-Prince bar association, Gervais Charles, said.

In a sign of further political turmoil for the beleaguered nation, groups of Duvalier supporters gathered outside the Hotel Karibe, calling for current President Rene Preval to be arrested instead.

"The revolution is beginning, arrest Preval,” they chanted, as witnesses reported the roads heading to the court building were swiftly being blocked with rocks and trash containers.

One protester, Gerant Jones, 30, said: "Young people know there was a dictatorship but he did a lot for Haiti... It’s different today. He has to stay. Haiti needs him.”

Although he was not handcuffed, Duvalier was led away in a convoy of armored vehicles bristling with swat police.

It was not clear what charges would be laid against Duvalier, who fled the country on a US Air Force plane in 1986 after a popular uprising, having allegedly siphoned away millions of dollars from the impoverished Caribbean country.

Haitian journalist, Michele Montas, the former spokeswoman for UN chief Ban Ki-moon, confirmed she was planning to file a suit against Duvalier.

She was forced into exile for several years during Duvalier’s rule, and her husband, Jean Dominique, was assassinated in 2000 after repeated criticism of the party of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who became president in 2001.

"We wanted to file a collective suit, but finally on the advice of our lawyers we are going to file three or four individual suits as soon as possible,” she said.

"Baby Doc” came to power in 1971 when he was just 19. Succeeding his repressive father Francois "Papa Doc” Duvalier at his death, the precocious young leader with a playboy lifestyle was not expected to last long.

But like his father, he controlled the impoverished Caribbean nation with an iron fist - barring opposition, clamping down on dissidents, rubber-stamping his own laws and pocketing government revenue.

The dreaded Tonton Macoutes, a secret police force loyal to the Duvalier family, have been accused of kidnapping, torturing and killing up to 30,000 suspected opponents during the 1960s and 1970s.

In 2007, Duvalier called on Haitians to forgive him for the "mistakes” committed during his reign, but Preval dismissed his remarks at the time and said the former dictator should face justice.

On Sunday, "Baby Doc” arrived back from exile in France to a country in as much turmoil as when he left. His companion, Veronique Roy, said that he had returned as a gesture of solidarity to the stricken nation.