WASHINGTON, July 15, 2003

PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- The United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations held a hearing today entitled "Successes and Challenges of U.S. Policy Toward Haiti." The panel heard testimony from Bush Administration officials, Undersecretaries Marc Grossman and John Taylor from the Departments of State and Treasury respectively, and covered a range of topics from the internal political stalemate between the governing party and some opposition political parties to the impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic on Haiti's population of eight million people. Senator Richard Lugar, committee chairman, set the theme by saying that "the hard part is translating vision into reality [and] to find common ground on the way forward in Haiti." Other Senators expressed specific concerns about the objectives of U.S. policy and urged the Administration to make changes in policy so that the U.S. is working more closely with the Government of Haiti on political and economic matters.

Senator Bill Nelson of Florida expressed his deep concern for what he described as a harsh and discriminatory U.S. immigration policy that seems to differentiate treatment of Haitian illegal immigrants compared to those of other nationalities. Senator Nelson also expressed his frustration with U.S. policy regarding the disbursement, or lack thereof, of humanitarian and development loans from the international financial institutions designated for Haiti. Several other Senators including Senator Chris Dodd and Senator Lincoln Chaffee joined Senator Nelson in his criticism of the U.S. policy of withholding loans as political leverage. Moreover, the Committee was unified in its support for the news from Undersecretary Taylor that all the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) are now moving forward with new lending commitments to the Government of Haiti.

On the political front, several Senators urged the Administration to work more closely with the Government of Haiti to move the political process forward and to hold elections as soon as practical. Senator Dodd was explicit in his criticism of U.S. policy and the role of the OAS Special Mission to Haiti and called on both institutions to seriously engage all parties to find a solution to the political crisis. "It is not clear to me that either the U.S. administration or the OAS leadership has any game plan for helping Haiti resolve the political impasse it finds itself caught in -- namely wanting and needing to have elections either by the end of the year or shortly thereafter -- but not being able to get all the players to join with the government in those elections." Senator Dodd questioned the purpose of Saturday's march into Cite Soleil by the Group of 184 referring to the provocative nature of the event as not unlike Protestants in North Ireland marching through Catholic areas of Belfast every July.

The hearing's three additional witnesses from the private sector included Dr. Paul Farmer, a Harvard physician who operates an HIV/AIDS clinic in Haiti, Mr. Steven Forester, an immigration attorney who represents Haitian Women of Miami, and Dr. Rudolf Moise, a Haitian American physician and CEO of the Haitian Broadcasting Network, also from Miami, Florida. Each panelist expressed hopes that the U.S. administration can work with the Haitian Government to address the massive development and political challenges facing the nation. In response to many questions regarding healthcare and IFI lending to Haiti, Dr. Farmer assertively summarized that public /private partnerships were the only means for addressing the health crises in Haiti, and the "Government should have a central role in healthcare [and] should not be placed into an untenable position of depleting 90% of its national reserves to simply to pay IDB arrears caused by US policies that prevented humanitarian lending for nearly two and one half years."

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