Investigation into the eviction of the occupants of the La Visite National Park

The park sits at Séguin, in the communal section of Marigot in the Sud-Est, inside the Massif de la Selle, and is one of the richest areas of biodiversity in the Caribbean: two thousand hectares, three hundred of them under pine forest and fragments of broadleaf. The report sets out its history. Peasants from Kasedan in the commune of Marigot were living there in 1942; in 1980 the government of the day reached an agreement with the forty-two families then present, and a decree creating the park followed in 1983. About one hundred and forty-two families live there now, farming and raising animals. On 23 March 2012 a group arrived at Séguin and numbered the houses; on 28 March the mayor of Marigot and the technical director of civil protection for the Sud-Est told the families the President had given them eighteen days, expiring on 15 April, to leave. On 23 July police fired on those protesting the eviction.

Four people were killed, three were reported missing, one officer was injured, four houses were burned, two oxen were killed and one wounded and two arrests were made; the bodies of those killed were found on 25 July. The network holds that forcing residents out of the park, like moving camp populations without decent alternative housing, drives the growth of slums and breaches Article 9 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, recently ratified by Haiti. It condemns the conduct of the departmental police director and the government commissioner for that jurisdiction and holds the Haitian state responsible for the events of 23 July, asking for an immediate inquiry, prosecution of all those involved, compensation for the victims' families, measures to prevent a repetition, and an arrangement that gets residents out of the park while respecting their rights.