Human rights in Haiti

According to its Constitution and written laws, Haiti meets most international human rights standards. In practice, many provisions are not respected. The government’s human rights record is poor. Political killings, kidnapping, torture, and unlawful incarceration are common unofficial practices, especially during periods of coups or attempted coups.

The land that would become Haiti was first colonized by Spain at the end of the 15th century. The Spanish essentially wiped out the native Taíno people through slavery and diseases, such as smallpox, to which the Taíno had no immunity. An early defender of more humane treatment of the Taíno was the Spanish priest Bartolomé de Las Casas. Albeit too late to save the Taíno, Las Casas was able to persuade the Spanish government that the Taíno could not withstand such cruel treatment. This had the tragic side effect of the importation of African slaves to replace the labor of the diminishing Taíno.

Initially, Las Casas believed Africans to be suitable for slavery, but he later came to oppose their enslavement too. "I soon repented and judged myself guilty of ignorance. I came to realize that black slavery was as unjust as Indian slavery...and I was not sure that my ignorance and good faith would secure me in the eyes of God," Las Casas wrote in The History of the Indies in 1527.

In 1697, Spain formally ceded to France control of the part of the island of Hispaniola that would become Haiti, naming it Saint-Domingue. Slavery in Saint-Domingue, France’s most lucrative colony, was known to be especially brutal, with a complete turnover of the slave population due to death every 20 years. According to the historian Laurent Dubois, between 5 and 10 percent of slaves died every year due to overwork and disease, a rate that outpaced births. The dead were replaced by new slaves from Africa.

In 1791, what would become known as the Haitian Revolution began. Predominantly a slave revolt, Haitians finally won their freedom and independence from France in 1804.

In 1825, France’s King Charles X threatened to invade Haiti unless it paid an “independence debt” of 150 million francs to reimburse France for the loss of its slaves and land. The debt was later reduced to 90 million francs but it was not until 1947 that Haiti had paid off what many have regarded as an immoral and illegal debt. To pay this, Haiti had to borrow money from and pay interest to French banks.

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Wikipedia