There is no political persecution in Haiti
by Haiti Information Project
On June 11, Special Representative and Head of the U.N. Mission in Haiti
Juan Gabriel Valdes, made a statement on Haitian radio stations
declaring he had lived through the Pinochet dictatorship and, "compared
to that experience, there is no political persecution in Haiti."
Although his comment was broadcast throughout Haiti's capital, it was
ridiculous enough to be ignored by the mainstream international media.
More ominously, Valdes comments mirror those of Haiti's traditional
economic and political elites, the very forces that are working to
close the door on national reconciliation and to exclude Aristide's
Lavalas party from participating in the upcoming elections. His words
also represent a dangerous shift in U.N. policy in Haiti following what
appeared to be a period of acknowledgement of the daily reality of
political repression against Lavalas supporters.
For a short time there was hope that the U.N. was serious about checking
the rabid hatred of Haiti's elites towards Lavalas and addressing the
human rights violations of the Haitian police. The commander of U.N.
forces in Haiti, Brazilian Lt. Gen. Augusto Heleno Ribeiro, protested
after the Haitian police fired on a peaceful demonstration by
supporters of ousted president Jean-Bertrand Aristide on Feb. 28.
According to the Associated Press (AP) Ribero said on March 1, "police
killings had poisoned an atmosphere that peacekeepers had been working
to improve for two months." Ribero continued, "But police went there
and killed six people on Friday ... now we're being received with a
completely different attitude." On March 4, Valdes himself was quoted
in the Miami Herald, "We cannot tolerate executions-we can't tolerate
shooting out of control. We will not permit human rights abuses."
According to the Herald, Valdes also promised that, "U.N. peacekeepers
will intervene - and use force if necessary - if Haitian police attack
unarmed civilians again."
After the police killings of Feb. 28, the U.N. reacted by barring the
Haitian police from security duties during demonstrations the following
week. This U.N. policy is short-lived as interim Justice Minister
Bernard Gousse claims that the limits placed on the police by the U.N.
are illegal and usurp the rights of the Haitian state. The U.N. backs
down to the pressure and allows the Haitian police to resume the
killing during another peaceful demonstration on April 27. This attack
prompts another outcry by human rights organizations and finally forces
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan to echo their demands for an official
investigation. The U.S.-installed government of Gerard Latortue
dismissed the allegations and the statements of Ribera, Valdes and
Annan despite video footage taken by a local television station
confirming the unprovoked attacks. The video footage also showed
members of Haiti's police force planting guns on corpses to justify the
slayings on April 27.
Valdes reportedly asked Leslie Voltaire, a former official in Aristide's
administration before his ouster, about the existence of this video
footage. According to Voltaire, Valdes was not even aware that the
footage had been broadcast several times on a local television station.
According to Voltaire, "He didn't even know that the television station
existed." Since then, Valdes and the U.N. have completely ignored the
evidence of extra-judicial killings committed by the Haitian police and
have failed to launch an investigation.
The U.N.'s inaction for holding the police accountable sent a clear
message throughout Haiti society that impunity for crimes committed by
the Haitian police would be tolerated. It was exactly this message of
impunity that set the tone and context for the recent wave of
kidnappings and violence plaguing Port au Prince. It also served to
confirm for Lavalas supporters that the U.N. was itself complicit in
the killings, especially after its military forces were seen to resume
collaboration with the police in subsequent deadly raids against poor
neighborhoods of the capital.
In the absence of holding the police accountable, the only thing lacking
was an official justification for the U.N.'s continuing collaboration
with the police and turning a blind-eye to their human rights record.
On May 27, this justification was provided by the Haitian elite and
delivered by the President of the Haitian Chamber of Commerce and
Industry, Dr. Reginald Boulos. During this meeting between the business
community and Haiti's Chief of Police Leon Charles, Boulos demanded the
U.S.-installed government of Gerard Latortue allow the business
community to form their own private security firms and arm them with
automatic weapons. This was clearly a demand to legalize the business
community's own private militias to kill what Boulos, and others in his
circle, have referred to as "Lavalas bandits." Boulos also suggested
the Latortue regime allow businesses to withhold taxes for one month
and use the money to buy more powerful weapons for the police on the
international market. These statements served the dual purpose of
pressuring the U.N. with the image of government sanctioned private
militias killing off Lavalas supporters while providing another pretext
for the Bush administration to lift the 14 year-old arms embargo against
Haiti. "If they don't allow us to do this then we'll take on own
initiative and do it anyway" Boulos threatened.
Following Boulos statements, Chief of Police Leon Charles addressed the
business leaders and further politicized the issue of violence and
insecurity casting it as a "war against urban guerillas" bent on
destabilizing the Haitian government. Without saying Lavalas, Charles
used the code word that has come to describe Aristide's political party
among Haiti's entrenched elites, "bandits."
In the days following May 27, other members of Haiti's business elite
began to criticize the U.N. for being too soft on the "bandits"
demanding they take harsher action. Industrialist and virulent Aristide
opponent, Charles Henry Baker, took to the airwaves on May 30 and pushed
it one step further by accusing U.N. forces of providing protection to
the "bandits." Baker stated on Radio Metropole, "Yesterday morning,
when I saw MINUSTAH [UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti] troops
positioned on the Airport Road, I told myself we were in big trouble.
Because the presence of MINUSTAH troops is, I believe, a form of
protection for the armed bandits and nothing more. The bandits are
indeed at work in these places. As for the police [pauses] and as for
the MINUSTAH troops, once they hear shooting, they just get inside
their tanks for protection and do nothing. Meanwhile, the bandits do
whatever they want."
The pressure campaign by Haiti's elite reaches critical mass as the U.N.
and the Haitian police launch a major offensive against the poor
neighborhood of Cite Soleil on the morning of May 31. According to
residents, the U.N. and the police entered the area and began shooting
indiscriminately in the street and at homes without provocation. Elie
Theodore was running from the gunfire when a bullet struck him in the
back of the head. He did not die instantly and writhed in pain as blood
and brains flowed out of the back of his head. Solange Emitide ran for
cover into her house and hid under the bed when two bullets struck her
in the back. Solange managed to crawl out to the front of her house
where she died in a puddle of her own blood. Panicked children fled
their schools to return home through plumes of black smoke as automatic
weapons fire hit propane tanks used for cooking and set several
buildings ablaze. None of this received any mention on Haitian radio
stations in the capital or in subsequent reports filed by the
international press. What did catch their attention was an attack by
unidentified gunmen on a large market on the outskirts of Cite Soleil
called Marche Te Bouef. Several people are burned to death in the
market after the same gunmen reportedly throw Molotov cocktails setting
the structure ablaze.
The next day the Haitian elite, echoed in the international press,
accuse the now infamous "Lavalas bandits" of striking again. The
rhetoric calling for U.N. military actions against the poor
neighborhoods intensifies in the Haitian press as accusations of human
rights abuses by the Haitian police are conveniently forgotten.
Ironically, on the same day Sanel Joseph is laid to rest in a funeral
conducted by Father Gerard Jean-Juste in Cite Soleil. Following another
peaceful Lavalas demonstration on May 18, the Haitian police gunned down
Joseph as he returned home. During the homily Jean-Juste declared,
"Sanel died standing up for the Haitian constitution. He believed in
the law but now the law has been turned against the poor and those who
stand for justice. There is no justice in Haiti today!"
On June 3, the Haitian police begin four days of operations against the
population in the neighborhood of Bel Air. Journalists entering the
neighborhood were shown huge pools of blood where victims were
reportedly shot without warning and residents indicated that more than
30 people have been killed during the police raids. More than 12 homes
were reportedly burned to the ground in what many human rights
observers have described as a "scorched earth" policy being used by the
Haitian police. Residents also reported being unable to flee
indiscriminate shooting by the police without running into roadblocks
and checkpoints set up by U.N. forces surrounding the area. Many
complained of arbitrary arrests of relatives by U.N. forces
collaborating with the Haitian police as they tried to escape the
gunfire.
The U.N. backed raids and killings in Bel Air, meant to assuage Haiti's
elite, were apparently not enough to insure compliance with the plans
of U.S. policymakers. On June 5, a Sunday editorial in The Washington
Post reports that the "U.S. Embassy in Haiti had recommended sending a
small force of U.S. Marines to secure elections scheduled for October
and November." Michel Brunache, Haiti's Cabinet chief responded in the
Associated Press on June 6, "We hope the U.S. government will move
quickly with any plans because the situation is very grave, and 1,000
Marines would make a difference."
The U.S. government also announces on June 8 that it plans on lifting
the 14 year-old arms embargo against Haiti. During a ceremony at which
the U.S. Embassy donated $2.6 million worth of equipment to the Haitian
police, U.S. Ambassador James B. Foley stated, "Those weapons are a very
important element in the capacity of the Haitian police to ensure
security." To emphasis the U.S. policy of further militarizing Haiti's
police, US assistant secretary for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere
Affairs Roger Noriega arrives in Haiti the same day. Echoing the
criticisms of Haiti's elite Noriega says to the international press;
"We regard it as extremely important that the United Nations take the
necessary measures to fulfill their mandate." Without considering the
death toll in Bel Air prior to his visit Noriega continued, "It is
urgent that they respond to the wave of violence and to the insecurity
to assure the Haitian people that they are safe."
The international community and the U.N. forces are on the ground in
Haiti to prepare for new elections and "restore democracy." Given the
tremendous human tragedy left in the wake of the overthrow of Aristide,
elections are the only process left to legitimize the carnage. The U.N.
is hostage to Haiti's ultra-reactionary elite and U.S. foreign policy
that dictates that elections can only be held if violence is eradicated
by military force and more guns. Any attempt to address the underlying
causes of violence in Haiti today is inconvenient because it means
recognizing the political repression being meted upon Lavalas. It means
confessing that the Haitian police have been given carte blanche to kill
peaceful demonstrators with impunity. It means recognizing the plight of
Lavalas political prisoners being held without charges in Haitian jails.
It means admitting that Haiti's largest political party is justified in
not participating in the next elections. It means admitting that Juan
Gabriel Valdes is lying and knows better when he says, "there is no
political persecution in Haiti."
The Haiti Information Project (HIP) is a non-profit alternative news
service providing coverage and analysis of breaking developments in
Haiti.