Stories written by Jane Regan
Jane Regan is an investigative journalist, communications scholar and documentary filmmaker who has worked in Haiti for most of the past two decades and who now runs a multimedia newsroom in Somerville, Massachusetts. Her work has been featured by The Miami Herald, The Christian Science Monitor, IPS, Associated Press Television News, BBC, the Public Broadcasting System and numerous other outlets.
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A dozen ex-soldiers from Haiti's long-disbanded army paraded through the streets of this impoverished port town Monday to the improbable cries of "Long live the Haitian Army!"
When some 300 workers lost their jobs at factories in northeast Haiti last month, the two sides in the struggle pitting a clothing maker against a young union only dug in deeper.
Haiti has a new, all-embracing plan aimed at pulling the country out of its economic, social and political rut with new roads and schools, policy changes and millions upon millions of dollars.
After a slow start, money is starting to trickle into the ministers who recently took over the country classified as the poorest, hungriest, most environmentally degraded, least electrified, sickest, most unemployed and least educated in the Americas.
When alleged death squad leader and rebel commander Louis Jodel Chamblain handed himself over to authorities this week, the number of gun-toting criminals on Haiti's streets and hillsides dropped by one.
When alleged death squad leader and rebel commander Louis Jodel Chamblain handed himself over to authorities this week, the number of gun-toting criminals on Haiti's streets and hillsides dropped by one.
The flies hovering over the stinking, shining green open sewers here do not appear to notice any change. Nor do the naked children, their distended bellies and orange hair sure signs of malnutrition, worms or worse.
At an inauguration ceremony guarded by U.S. Marines, Haiti's interim president on Monday called for "reconciliation" and "peace", but as shooting, looting, threats of a resurgent rebel army and political squabbling continue against a backdrop of foreign troops, these simple goals might remain illusive.
For the fourth time in the past 100 years, U.S. army boots are marching on Haitian soil. Humvee armoured cars rumble down the main boulevards of the capital and camouflaged tanks train their long cannons towards the pedestrians and drivers who pass the proud gleaming white National Palace and stately prime minister's office.
As the world waited Friday for a decisive move that would herald yet another extreme political change in this plagued nation, Haiti and the Haitian people find themselves in an almost impossible Chinese puzzle.
As the world waited Friday for a decisive move that would herald yet another extreme political change in this plagued nation, Haiti and the Haitian people find themselves in an almost impossible Chinese puzzle.
As the world waited Friday for a decisive move that would herald yet another extreme political change in this plagued nation, Haiti and the Haitian people find themselves in an almost impossible Chinese puzzle.
Caribbean leaders will try their hand where others have failed when they sit down with Haitian opposition leaders in Bahamas this week, but observers here remain very sceptical of any positive outcome.
"Down with Aristide! Down with Aristide! We don't want him any more!'' screamed the street vendor as she hurried through the black billows of smoke rising from a pile of flaming tires, her tattered sandals crunching on the broken glass and twisted metal of the freshly built barricade.
In the tropical forest not far from here 212 years ago, runaway African slaves gathered for a secret meeting and Vodou ceremony where they vowed to abolish slavery and French rule over their island nation, launching the 13-year revolutionary struggle that gave birth to the world's first black republic Jan. 1, 1804.
''My mother and my godmother helped deliver him right there,'' said Marie-Michelle, 27, smiling as she balanced the chubby six-month-old on one hip and pointed to the unmade bed.