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US Democracy Promotion and Haiti

(anthony fenton article and interview)

ZNet | Haiti

US Democracy Promotion and Haiti

by Anthony Fenton and Amy Goodman; Democracy Now!; January 23, 2006

Nearly two years after the overthrow of President Jean Bertrand
Aristide, Haiti will be holding national elections next month.
Former President Rene Preval, a Aristide ally, is leading in the
polls. Meanwhile, a judge has dropped the most serious charges
against jailed priest Gerard Jean Juste. Jean Juste was imprisoned
in July over the murder of journalist Jacques Roche - killed while
Jean Juste was in Miami. After Jean Juste's arrest, Haitian
officials prevented Lavalas - the political movement aligned with
Aristide - from registering him as their presidential candidate, on
the grounds he was imprisoned. Although he has been cleared in
Roche's murder, authorities say Jean Juste will remain in prison
over weapons charges. Amnesty International calls him a prisoner of
conscience. Calls for his release have intensified with the recent
announcement he's been diagnosed with leukemia.
Meanwhile, violence continues to affect Haiti's poorest areas. Last
week, two Jordanian troops with the UN mission were killed in a gun-
battle in the poor neighborhood of Cite Soleil. Local residents
later reported UN troops had shot at a hospital in the area. UN
troops have stepped up armed raids on Cite Soleil amid pressure from
business leaders and foreign officials.

We want to continue our Haiti coverage leading up to the election by
looking at the activities of a government-funded organization that
is pouring millions of dollars into trying to influence the
country's political future. The National Endowment for Democracy is
one of a handful of state-funded groups that have played a pivotal
role in the internal politics of several Latin American and
Caribbean countries in the service of the US government.

The NED operates with an annual budget of $80 million dollars from
U.S. Congress and the State Department. In Venezuela, it's given
money to several political opponents of President Hugo Chavez. With
elections underway in Haiti, it's reportedly doing the same to
groups linked to the country's tiny elite and former military.

Last week Democracy Now! interviewed Anthony Fenton about NED's
activities in Haiti and across the Caribbean and Latin America.
Fenton is an independent journalist and co-author of the
book "Canada in Haiti: Waging War On The Poor Majority." He has
interviewed several top governmental and non-governmental officials
dealing with Haiti as well as leading members of Haiti's business
community. Last month, he helped expose an NED-funded journalist who
was filing stories for the Associated Press from Haiti. The
Associated Press subsequently terminated its relationship with the
journalist.



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RUSH TRANSCRIPT

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Donate - $25, $50, $100, more...

AMY GOODMAN: Last week, I interviewed Anthony Fenton, about N.E.D.'s
activities in Haiti and across the Caribbean and Latin America.
Fenton is an independent Canadian journalist and co-author of the
book, Canada in Haiti: Waging War on the Poor Majority. He has
interviewed several top governmental and non-governmental officials
dealing with Haiti, as well as leading members of Haiti's business
community. Last month, he helped expose an N.E.D.-funded journalist
who was filing stories for the Associated Press from Haiti. The
Associated Press subsequently terminated its relationship with her.
We go now to an excerpt from that interview. Anthony Fenton was in a
studio in Vancouver. I began by asking him to talk about the current
situation in Haiti.

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, indeed, obviously, there is an ongoing
military occupation there ever since the forced ouster of President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide in February of 2004 in a coup d'etat that was
assisted and planned by the Canadian government, along with the U.S.
government and the French government. Of course, speaking from
Canada, Canada played an integral role in the overthrow of Aristide
and continues to play an integral role in the post-invasion
occupation of Haiti.

They're leading up to what are now the fourth scheduled period of
elections. There have been several postponements. This is due in
part -- the original intention of the invasion, of course, was to
subvert the young process of popular democracy that existed in Haiti
prior to the coup, and of course, if Aristide hadn't been
overthrown, Haiti would have already carried out their democratic
election, their presidential elections.

And, of course, the fear of the United States and of organizations
like the National Endowment for Democracy and the State Department,
of course, was that popular democracy would take root in Haiti under
another Lavalas government, and they have set about to undermine the
popular movement that existed in support of Jean-Bertrand Aristide
and the Lavalas Party. And we're seeing today the consolidation of
the elite rule that they have long envisioned for Haiti ever since
the fall of "Baby Doc" Duvalier in the mid-80s.

AMY GOODMAN: Anthony, can you just lay out what the National
Endowment for Democracy is?

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, yeah, they were formed in the early 1980s
under the Reagan administration. Ostensibly, they purport to promote
pro-democracy organizations and democratic values across the world.
Just last October, President Bush spoke at a National Endowment for
Democracy gathering, reiterating the vision of Reagan as he set
about to, as they say, "promote democracy throughout the world," and
they were given – they've been given various budgets allocated by
Congress every year, as you said at the onset. Now their budget
stands at $80 million a year. But they are, of course, just one
organization among many that are linked to the U.S. Agency for
International Development, as I said, the State Department. Hundreds
of millions of dollars now, in fact, more money is now being spent
than ever before on what they call democracy promotion.

Now, the historical record on the National Endowment for Democracy
is very clear, when we look at the work of people like Philip Agee
and William Robinson and William Blum, Noam Chomsky and others, and
most recently, if we look at the work of attorney and independent
journalist, Eva Golinger, who exposed, through Freedom of
Information Act requests, the role that the N.E.D. played in
attempting to subvert democracy and the revolutionary process that's
unfolding in Venezuela in 2002. The N.E.D. played a crucial role in
fomenting the opposition to Hugo Chavez, and they did play a role in
the attempted coup against him in April of 2002, and very much the
same patterns we have seen develop in Haiti.

On your show, in 2004, you interviewed Max Blumenthal, who wrote an
article, an important article for Salon that outlined the role of
the International Republican Institute, and when we talk about the
N.E.D., we can't talk about them without also talking about the
International Republican Institute and the other affiliated
organizations. There's a virtual labyrinth of these organizations
that receive funding that's specifically earmarked for the
undermining of any widespread social movements, any rudiments of
popular democracy that should manifest, either in Latin America or
anywhere in the world.

So, again, this is sort of the premise of what the National
Endowment for Democracy really does, and as we look at what they're
doing in Haiti – and how I was able to learn about what they're
currently doing in Haiti came about through the process of a first
documentary reporting trip to Haiti in September and October of
2005, where we spoke to a number of N.E.D. grantees, Haitian
organizations that received funding from the National Endowment for
Democracy. I returned to Canada and set about to conduct a series of
interviews with N.E.D. and any program officer, in particular, with
I.R.I. officials, with in-country officials who are managing several
million dollars in U.S.-funded democracy promotion activities, as
you said also, that are linked closely to the Haitian elite, to the
opposition organizations, such as the Group of 184, the Democratic
Convergence. These are the organizations that agitated most strongly
for the overthrow of Aristide and that were working with the N.E.D.
and the I.R.I. in the years preceding the 2004 coup.

AMY GOODMAN: The I.R.I. being the International Republican
Institute.

ANTHONY FENTON: Yes. We know that – for example, just the other day,
I spoke to a woman who is the leader of an organization called
COFEL. It's an umbrella organization of women political leaders. In
the years before the coup against Aristide in 2004, the I.R.I. would
bring in, they would bus in or fly in groups of anywhere between 60
and 80 of these women. And, of course, they're busing in other men
and other political figures in Haiti. But they would bus them into
the Dominican Republic, because in 1999, at the time, Ambassador
Timothy Carney – he was the U.S. ambassador at the time. That's very
important, because Ambassador Carney is the current interim
ambassador to Haiti, and he was also a member of the lobby – the
think tank in Washington called the Haiti Democracy Project that
played an integral role in fomenting this demonization campaign
against Aristide.

In any case, in 1999, the I.R.I. was closed down. Their operations
were shut down. They were forced to leave Haiti, and until the coup
in 2004, the I.R.I. did not have an in-country presence, so they
were doing most of their work in the Dominican Republic with people
like Stanley Lucas, who is well known as a card-carrying Republican
Haitian American who was hired by the International Republican
Institute during the first coup period against Aristide in the early
1990s, and he's the one who sort of helped to build the political
opposition from the Dominican Republic and enable the coup to take
place. But that process has just followed through since the coup.
Well, of course, the International Republican Institute now has an
in-country office in Haiti, and through that office they're able to
penetrate all sectors of Haitian civil society in their attempt to
undermine the popular movement.

Now, I would like to mention that in my interview, and this is a
rare interview with an N.E.D. program officer, and this is the
program officer in Washington who is responsible for Haiti
currently, a woman named Fabiola Cordoba. She took over in, I
believe in, November, as the program officer, and she revealed to
me, not only an extensive list of documents that show the N.E.D.'s
approved grants for 2005. These are, in a sense, declassified,
because these are documents that are not supposed to be published
until May of 2006, at least according to another N.E.D.
spokesperson. But what's clear in these documents is that the N.E.D.
went from, for example, a zero dollar budget in Haiti in 2003 to a
$540,000 budget in Haiti in 2005.

What they've also done -- and many Haitian people that I speak to
have told me that Haiti is considered the laboratory for these sort
of subversive activities on the part of the United States
government. And in the context of this experimental process, they've
hired, for the first time, an in-country program officer, as you
mentioned, Régine Alexandre, who was a stringer for the Associated
Press and the New York Times, was doubling, moonlighting as an
N.E.D. program officer, and the Associated Press severed ties with
her as a result.

Now, Fabiola Cordoba also told me that when she was in Haiti in
2002, working for one of the N.E.D.'s affiliated organizations, the
National Democratic Institute, she said a lot of lines were being
drawn between Haiti and Venezuela, where although 70% of the
population supported Aristide, there was a very fragmented
opposition. The rest of the 30% was divided between 120 different
opposition groups, so the objective of the I.R.I. and the N.E.D. was
to consolidate this opposition to build a viable opposition to
somehow break the grip that the popular movement in Haiti had on the
political environment there. And she said that Chavez – something
very similar was happening in Venezuela, and of course, in 2002, the
coup d'état happened there on the basis of this sort of analysis,
the basis, this fear that the United States has of popular democracy
and the need to subvert any attempts at consolidating popular rule
and implementing policies that are in the interests of the majority
poor in places like Venezuela and Haiti.

AMY GOODMAN: We're talking to Anthony Fenton, independent author and
journalist who has exposed a A.P. stringer in Haiti, Régine
Alexandre, as also being on the payroll of the National Endowment
for Democracy. And now talking about those parallels between Haiti
and Venezuela, of course, 2002, the attempted coup against Hugo
Chavez, what is your understanding of the U.S. involvement in terms
of the, you know, dollar amount in Venezuela, putting money into the
opposition?

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, it is very interesting, because since the
activities of the N.E.D. have been so thoroughly exposed by the
likes of Eva Golinger and Jeremy Bigwood through The Chavez Code,
they're very concerned with their perception in the area. So what
they're doing, in a way, they've continued to funnel large amounts
of money into Venezuela, but they're doing it also by outsourcing,
if you will. For example, they have given a grant to a Canadian
think tank called the Canadian Foundation of the Americas, and
through that, they're attempting to go through the back door, if you
will, riding the perception of Canada as being a benign
counterweight to the U.S. in the hemisphere, in order to penetrate
Venezuelan civil society.

This is an important year, of course, not only in Venezuela, but
throughout the hemisphere, in the sense that there are many
presidential elections taking place. Now the N.E.D. program officer
told me that Venezuela, Haiti, Ecuador, and Bolivia are the four top
priority countries for the N.E.D. in 2006, looking ahead to 2006
and, of course, Cuba is the perennial top of that list. They're a
special exception, because the Department of State earmarks a
certain amount of funds for the N.E.D.'s work in Cuba. In fact, they
doubled the amount of money being used to subvert revolutionary Cuba
in 2005.

Now, what they're doing with the Foundation of the Americas is, in
fact, on the board of directors there you have a former coup plotter
in the form of Beatrice Rangel, who not only played an active role,
when she was an advisor to former Venezuelan president Perez in the
late 1980s, literally carrying bags of money, according to William
Robinson, to Nicaraguan Contras operating out of Venezuela, but she
is the person, Rangel, who facilitated this N.E.D. program with this
Canadian think tank, and she herself said that, you know, Canada
enjoys this perception, and N.E.D.'s outsourcing to Canada is just
another way for the N.E.D. to penetrate Venezuelan civil society.

But in the case of Haiti, getting back to that point, what we're
seeing is the N.E.D. works very closely with the International
Republican Institute. One of the N.E.D.'s primary grantees in Haiti
is a key member of the Group of 184 political opposition to
Aristide, named Hans Tippenhauer. He heads up an organization that
works with Haitian youth. Typically we see the N.E.D. working with
Haitian youth, with Haitian women, but what they're doing – Mr.
Tippenhauer, he was one of the first people to call the rebels, the
paramilitaries that entered from the Dominican Republic in 2004, he
referred to them as "freedom fighters," and he get grants from, not
only the N.E.D., but also the I.R.I., and he also happens to be on
the campaign of an independent presidential candidate named Charles
Henri Baker, who was also one of the leaders of the Group of 184.
He's a sweatshop owner there and a brother-in-law of Andy Apaid,
another leader of the Group of 184, who recently has been
pressuring, with other members of the elite, such as Reginald
Boulos, for the United Nations [inaudible] to force to enter the
poor neighborhoods and commit more atrocities, so as to enable this
process of consolidating elite rule in Haiti to take root.

And so, Hans Tippenhauer, as he doubles as a campaign manager for
the Group 184 political candidate, the business candidate, basically
a candidate that the U.S. is supporting, he is also working to
penetrate Haitian civil society on a level that will allow, in the
long term, this neo-liberal vision, this corporate vision of Haiti
to take root, the so-called democracy, because the National
Endowment for Democracy does promote some form of democracy. It's a
very narrow institutional form, kind of like we see in Canada.

It is ironic that we have elections going on here in Canada right
now, but we don't see the National Endowment for Democracy or the
International Republican Institute here trying to manipulate the
political environment, because we're already on page with the State
Department. We're already on page with the N.E.D., so we don't need
their guidance, but a place like Haiti, where there were -- where
popular democracy was beginning to take root, even though in the
face of a massive economic embargo and in the face of
destabilization by these very organizations, it is very necessary
that these organizations are in Haiti right now playing this
fundamental role, behind the scenes, I should say, because the
mainstream media has not written a single story about what these
organizations are doing behind the scenes to effect political change
in Haiti today.

AMY GOODMAN: Independent journalist, Anthony Fenton. We will return
with him in a minute.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: We return to our interview on Haiti with independent
journalist Anthony Fenton, co-author of the book, Canada in Haiti:
Waging War on the Poor Majority.

AMY GOODMAN: Anthony Fenton, one of the people that you have written
and talked about is Ira Lowenthal. I remember him from, well, more
than a decade ago in the midst of the first coup against President
Aristide in 1991 to '94, working for USAID in-country in Haiti. What
is his role today?

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, after the coup, Ira Lowenthal reentered Haiti.
Now, he had had to leave, I believe, in 2002, because he was getting
too hot. He was up to some activities that were being scrutinized by
the Haitian government. Now, he joined and helped create the Haiti
Democracy Project in 2002, in late 2002, and then he supported the
emergence of the Group of 184 shortly thereafter, which is basically
the Haitian version of the Haiti Democracy Project. I mentioned the
Boulos family. Rudolph Boulos is a board member, founding board
member of the Haiti Democracy Project, as well, and he's actually
running for Senate in the area of Haiti where they plan to develop
free-trade zones and open up a whole swath of sweatshops.

But Ira Lowenthal, he was working for the Americas Development
Foundation, which is one of the key organizations implementing these
so-called Democracy Enhancement projects prior to the coup. After
the coup, he had a brief stint with them, and then he moved on to
this other organization called the United Nations Office for Project
Services. Now, it's a very interesting organization that does
reconstruction work, and they're working -- they're called the self-
financing arm or management services arm of the United Nations, very
obscure and little known, but Ira Lowenthal became the director of
this organization in Haiti just after the coup, and he helped set up
registration centers for the elections, and he's played an integral
role in the sort of infrastructure of carrying out this election
process.

Now, he stepped down as director of UNOPS, and UNOPS currently gets
a $3 million contract from USAID to work and funnel money to the
political parties -- the "approved" political parties, most of which
happen to comprise the former political opposition to Aristide, the
Democratic Convergence. Now Ira Lowenthal is a key consultant for
UNOPS today, and in fact, there's a Canadian by the name of Jean-
Francois Laurent, who directs the UNOPS activities in Haiti. But Ira
Lowenthal, anyone I speak to, everyone speaks glowingly of him in
the democracy promotion community. He's an old hand there, as you've
said. He had links to the Boulos family back in the previous coup
period, and, of course, the Boulos family is said to have had
relations with FRAP, the paramilitary organization set up by the
C.I.A. in order to destroy the popular movement at that time.

Now the Boulos family again, it has been widely reported that they
may be linked along with the Apaids to death squad activity in Cite
Soleil, anti-Lavalas gangs that are designed to destroy the popular
support for the calls of demanding the return of Aristide or
demanding the right to vote for the candidate of choice, now Rene
Preval. But Ira Lowenthal has played an instrumental role. In fact,
every week this organization, UNOPS, to give you an example of the
sort of familial relations there, they meet with the I.R.I., the
N.D.I., with USAID, and with I.F.E.S, which is linked to the I.R.I.
The chairman of I.F.E.S. is a former Reagan advisor and a Bush
appointee as U.N. ambassador just before the 9/11 attacks in 2001,
William Hybl.

So you see this family meeting on a weekly basis, coordinating their
activities. They're funneling millions of dollars to the political
parties, by way of giving them credits for TV advertising, for
pamphlets, for t-shirts and all sorts of other activities. And, of
course, this is all geared towards -- they're hoping, I think, right
now, that there will be a run-off election, sort of like there was
in Liberia, where the International Republican Institute and these
other organizations played a central role, as well, because if
there's a run-off election -- and it's possible that one of their
rightwing candidates, perhaps such as Marc Bazin, who's running
under the Lavalas name today, but of course was a World Bank
candidate that Aristide beat in a landslide in 1990 -- they're
hoping that one of these candidates, maybe it'll be Henri Baker,
will be able to win in a run-off.

But there's also the terror card that they're holding over their
heads. The paramilitaries that entered in 2004 like Guy Philippe.
Other well known NARCO traffickers, the nephew of the current Prime
Minister, Gerard Latortue, his name is Youri Latortue, the mere
mention of his name in Haiti, strikes the fear in the people's eyes
when you speak to them, and this person is running for senate in the
Artibonite region. And the possibility of a violent intervention in
this election process is in the background, and it looms, and people
like Ira Lowenthal and these other organizations, the N.E.D., they
are well aware of this, and so it will be interesting to see how it
plays out.

AMY GOODMAN: And the role, Anthony Fenton -- you're speaking to us
from Vancouver, Canada, in the midst of your own elections -- of
Canada and the current candidates in the coup of 2004, as well as
what you understand is the U.S. role that forced Aristide out?

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, indeed, Canada in September hosted a meeting
with members of Haiti's private sector with that think tank that I
mentioned earlier that's getting N.E.D. funding, FOCAL, the
Foundation for the Americas. Reginald Boulos, one of the long-time
elites who supported this U.S. vision for Haiti and has long-
standing ties to Washington, he was invited to this meeting. And
what you were seeing is Canada supporting whole-heartedly. In fact,
Roger Noriega, former Secretary of State for the western hemisphere,
came to Canada just after the coup with Adolfo Franco from USAID.
Franco, incidentally, has refused to be interviewed on the question
of USAID's activities on the democracy promotion side in Haiti
recently. But they came to Canada just after the coup with the
intention of asking Canada to play a leadership role in Haiti, and
Canada quickly acquiesced.

In fact, when I was in Haiti in September with a couple of other
Canadian journalists, we interviewed a top-level Canadian diplomat,
and he was boasting how finally in Haiti there's a government that's
being ruled by the transnational elite in the private sector and
civil society. And Canada's job is to stand on the frontlines
diplomatically, politically, and they're also helping out
militarily, and on the intelligence side, to prop up this
illegitimate regime that was installed by the United States, that
was imported from Florida and installed -- imposed on the Haitian
people. And so Canada is playing an increasing role and they are
expecting to play -- in fact, this high level diplomat told us
Canada is sort of like earning its stripes in Haiti, because there
is going to be a coming transition, and he mentioned Cuba
specifically, and of course, strategically where Haiti is situated --
the State Department in 2005 listed Haiti and Colombia as the two
primary strategic states -- so it's very important that they take
control of Haiti.

There is a Dominican Republic interest there, as well. They are
possibly establishing military bases there. The U.S. has for a long
time dictated the Dominican military's policies for the region, and
the Canadian government here, what we're seeing, is under the
liberal government that is about, it appears, to lose power to a neo-
conservative electoral coup, if you will, led by Canada's
Conservative Party and Stephen Harper, who is a well-known admirer
of George Bush. Canada, the liberal government, initiated a
rightwing shift over the past decade, that we've seen a new role for
Canada in the Americas. In fact, this high-level diplomat referred
to the destiny of Canada and the Americas being fulfilled through
their role in Haiti today.

AMY GOODMAN: Anthony Fenton is our guest. He's speaking to us from
Vancouver, Canada. And the proof of the involvement of the U.S.
government in the coup that forced out President Aristide February
29th, 2004?

ANTHONY FENTON: Well, in 2003 there was a meeting held in Ottawa
called the Ottawa Initiative on Haiti. At the time, it was a secret
high level round table that did not involve any Haitians, although
it was a meeting that was designed to discuss the future of Haiti.
It was leaked by the host of that meeting, a Canadian Member of
Parliament named Denis Paradis, to a Quebec magazine, that the
possibility of removing Aristide and installing a U.N.-style
trusteeship was discussed. This was quickly glossed over, and the
Canadian government retracted that this was discussed, but after the
coup I submitted a Freedom of Information Act request and did
receive some of the documents, which seem to corroborate what was
leaked at the time, that there were high-level meetings being held
not only in Ottawa, but other follow-up meetings, I understand, in
Washington and in El Salvador that planned the overthrow of Aristide
on the diplomatic side.

The Organization of American States was involved. And the then
Assistant Secretary General of the O.A.S., Luigi Einaudi, who
famously said on the eve of Haiti's independence, `The problem with
Haiti is that the international community is so screwed up and
divided that we're actually allowing Haitians to run Haiti.' It's
people like this and sentiments like this that informed these sorts
of meetings that took place before the coup, and, you know, the
writing was on the wall for Aristide when he was elected in November
of 2000. We saw the opposition boycott the elections. The Gallup
polls indicated a landslide victory for Aristide, and again we
return to the point made by the N.E.D. program officer, it was
simply the case that, from the perspective of the United States,
Canada, and France, and the European Union, the primary backers of
this coup d'etat, that Aristide was consolidating power, that the
Lavalas Party, in particular, and that the popular movement was
emerging and was taking root, and that is what had to be overthrown
and stopped in its tracks, and that's what we're seeing happen
today.

AMY GOODMAN: Very quickly, Anthony Fenton, on the issue of what is
happening in the Cite Soleil with the killings of innocent residents
there, also the killings of U.N. forces there, recently you had
Reginald Boulos and Andy Apaid, well known anti-Lavalas leaders,
holding a major protest, calling for a crackdown on Cite Soleil. Can
you talk about that?

ANTHONY FENTON: Yeah, again, this -- I read that as a provocation.
They've been -- if you go back to summer of 2005, there was a
kidnapping spree, as the The New York Times and the L.A. Times
reported it, that was used as a pretext to demand that the U.N. go
into Cite Soleil and root out the so-called chimeres, the so-called
bandits, the so-called terrorists. Now, I learned through sources
inside the prime minister's office in Haiti and through other
sources that, again, Youri Latortue, the nephew of Gerard Latortue,
was involved in this kidnapping spree, that he was carrying out and
overseeing a kidnapping ring of his own that was used as a pretext
to go into these neighborhoods and commit massacres. And on July
6th, it's been well reported and well documented that a massacre did
take place, and it was carried out by the United Nations. It buckled
to the pressure that was being exerted on it by the likes of
Reginald Boulos and other members of the elite, like Andy Apaid.

And so I see, I think, from what I can tell, this is being replayed,
and the kidnapping spree -- it's possible that these assaults on the
so-called peacekeepers, the Jordanians who have played one of the
more repressive roles in Cite Soleil, that that is another
provocation that is intended to pressure the U.N. forces to go into
Cite Soleil and fire arbitrarily, as they've been doing repeatedly.
You know, within the past few days a number of people have been
killed in Cite Soleil, even since that demonstration. Canadian
journalists who are there right now, Aaron Lakoff and Leslie Bagg,
reported on how four people in Cite Soleil have been killed.

And the U.N. knows that they can't go into Cite Soleil and conduct
these operations without killing civilians, and yet people like
Reginald Boulos don't seem to mind if civilians get killed. It's
just collateral damage, and he's said that he is willing to create a
fund to assist the victims of Cite Soleil. When we interviewed Mr.
Boulos in September, he referred to himself as Mr. Cite Soleil. So,
he has a vested interest in putting down this popular movement
that's calling for Aristide's return or calling for free and fair
elections that would see Rene Preval win in a likely landslide.

AMY GOODMAN: Independent journalist Anthony Fenton, co-author of the
book Canada in Haiti: Waging War on the Poor Majority. Haitian
elections are February 7.
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Old Jan 25, 06
AAA AAA is offline
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Join Date: Sep 2005
AAA is an unknown quantity at this point
bah soo loooooong and sooooo boooooring besides who care about what US is doing anyway? the only thing i cared about i heard on tv from Bush himself ... he finally anwsered the most important question to the open press which stated " I am mountain bike kinda guy" eh what can top that really? :P
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Old Jan 25, 06
armed & hammered
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Drafted is on a distinguished road
How many kids with ADD does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Do you wanna go ride bikes?
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  #4 (permalink)  
Old Jan 25, 06
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
fable is an unknown quantity at this point
Quote:
Originally Posted by AAA
bah soo loooooong and sooooo boooooring besides who care about what US is doing anyway? the only thing i cared about i heard on tv from Bush himself ... he finally anwsered the most important question to the open press which stated " I am mountain bike kinda guy" eh what can top that really? :P
Hmm, you do realize that Canada is heavilly involved with Haiti as well/ they recently built a 20 million dollar embassy, SNC-Lavelin was responsible for this project(the same montreal based company that is providing all small arms munitions in Iraq - the war that Canada is not part of) As well we have a RCMP force of a 100 members who are in directly supervise the Haitian National Police (do i need to go into their track record?) Canada was also leading the MUSTUFUH (sp?) Mission in Haiti for quite sometime including through two savage large scale massacress, headed by the HNP(trained by the RCMP) and stood back and did nothing stating they had no "jurisdiction" Canadian lead UN forces also played a significant role throughtout last year leading tactical full scale strikes in the some of the poorest ghettos in Haiti, including Cite Solie, and Port au Prince.

still boring?
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  #5 (permalink)  
Old Jan 25, 06
DESTROY EVERYTHING
 
Join Date: Jul 2003
hardstylin is just really nicehardstylin is just really nicehardstylin is just really nicehardstylin is just really nicehardstylin is just really nicehardstylin is just really nice
Quote:
Originally Posted by fable
still boring?
NO

Still to long

Fuck yes

why dont you give us fables short hand version of these articles you post.

I would be much more inclined to get into some of these with you If it didnt require reading a 30 page short story :)
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  #6 (permalink)  
Old Jan 25, 06
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2005
fable is an unknown quantity at this point
Quote:
Originally Posted by hardstylin
NO

Still to long

Fuck yes

why dont you give us fables short hand version of these articles you post.

I would be much more inclined to get into some of these with you If it didnt require reading a 30 page short story :)
yeah i do hear what your saying, but i dont write these articles, and i still havent mastered the fine art, of getting the message across, and not ripping into people when they say something ignorant, whether by mistake or on purpose.

These are actaully the transcripts from an Interview that author and independent journalist did on television recently,

No one says you got to read it in a day, i know i sure as hell didnt! :)
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