Former Haitian president Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, who ruled the impoverished Caribbean nation with an iron fist from 1971 until his ouster in 1986, died on Saturday of a heart attack. He was 63.
The death of Baby Doc, as he was commonly known, marks the end of a dark chapter for a desperate country plundered first by his father — former Haitian president Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier, a physician-turned-populist politician — before being further ravaged by his son.
An estimated 30,000 people were killed during the reign of the Duvalier father and son, rights activists say.
Photo: Reuters
Baby Doc returned to Haiti in 2011, after 25 years of exile, but the people he affected, opponents and activists never saw him face justice.
Despite that, reaction to his death was muted on the streets of Haiti.
Haitian President Michel Martelly called him “an authentic son of Haiti” on Twitter and sent his “sincere condolences to the family and to the nation.”
“Love and reconciliation must always prevail over our internal quarrels. May he rest in peace,” wrote Martelly, who said he was paying tribute to the former president “despite our quarrels and our differences.”
Baby Doc’s death in Port-au-Prince was announced by Haitian Minister of Health Florence Guillaume Duperval, who said the cause appeared to be a massive heart attack.
“The family phoned us this morning asking us to send a [medical] helicopter,” she told reporters.
“They tried to administer first aid to him on the scene, but he died” a short time later, she said.
The younger Duvalier came to power when he was just 19 years old, and for a decade-and-a-half ruled as Haiti’s self-proclaimed “president for life.”
Like his father, Baby Doc allowed little room for dissent, barring opposition, clamping down on dissidents, rubber-stamping his own laws and pocketing government revenue.
And like his father, he made liberal use of the dreaded Tonton Macoutes, a secret police force loyal to the Duvalier family.
The notorious sunglass-wearing Macoutes terrorized Haitians, arresting and torturing untold numbers of political opponents, thousands of whom vanished without ever being accounted for.
Born in Port-au-Prince on July 3, 1951, the young Duvalier watched the intrigue and paranoia escalate in his father’s 14-year government, which began in 1957 and saw waves of arrests, executions, bombings and 11 failed coups.
At the age of 11, he survived an attack that killed three of his bodyguards.
In 1986, he was forced into exile in a popular uprising, as pro-democracy forces rallied in the streets amid international condemnation of the rampant human rights abuses during his regime.
Baby Doc fled Haiti for a life of luxury in France, thanks to the hundreds of millions of dollars allegedly pilfered from the coffers of the most impoverished country in the Americas.
He was said in reports to have looted as much as US$300 million before being forced to flee.
In the late 1990s, former political prisoners brought charges of “crimes against humanity” against Baby Doc in a Paris court, claiming they were tortured over a period of years, but the lawsuit later foundered.
In 2007, Duvalier called on Haitians to forgive him for “mistakes” committed during his rule, even as the government in power at the time insisted he face trial.
After his return, he was charged in a slow-moving prosecution on corruption and embezzlement allegations dating to his years in power.
Efforts to bring him to justice became tangled in legal motions and appeals, and proved unsuccessful in the end.
Reed Brody of Human Rights Watch, who helped victims build their criminal case against the younger Duvalier, lamented that the former leader never paid for his crimes.
“[Jean-Claude] Duvalier’s rule was marked by systematic human rights violations. Hundreds of political prisoners held in a network of prisons died from mistreatment or were victims of extrajudicial killings,” Brody said. “Duvalier’s government repeatedly closed independent newspapers and radio stations. Journalists were beaten, in some cases tortured, jailed, and forced to leave the country.”
Meanwhile, much of the money looted by Baby Doc from Haiti’s treasury reportedly was frittered away on a lavish lifestyle filled with fancy homes, jewelry and cars.
Baby Doc returned to Haiti on January 16, 2011 in what he said was a gesture of solidarity with a nation that had been devastated the year before by a massive earthquake, which leveled much of Port-au-Prince and claimed more than 100,000 lives.
The day after his unexpected return, police arrested him on charges of embezzlement.
In February last year, he pleaded not guilty to charges of corruption and human rights abuses.
Other than his brief jailing shortly after his arrival, he remained free for the rest of his life.
“[Jean-Claude] Duvalier’s death deprives Haitians of what could have been the most important human rights trial in the country’s history,” Brody said.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was