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#2390: In 1982 Giuliani meets Jean-Claude (fwd)



From: Charles Arthur <charlesarthur@hotmail.com>

Keywords: Giuliani, Haitian refugees

Sorry if these articles - one from 1982, the other from 1999, have already 
appeared on the list - but at least they will now be in the archive.
Charles Arthur


From:
     ARTISTpres@aol.co m Date: Tue, 17 Aug 1999
     >From The New York Times, April 3, 1982, Saturday, Late City Final 
Edition, Section 1; Page 5, Column 4; Foreign Desk

     MIAMI (UPI) -- The third-ranking official of the Justice Department 
says he is convinced that there is "no political repression" in Haiti.

     Associate Attorney General Rudolph W. Giuliani, testifying Thursday at 
a hearing of a class-action lawsuit seeking the release of 2,100 refugees in 
Government detention camps, said that repression in Haiti "simply does not 
exist now" and that refugees had nothing to fear from the Government of 
Jean-Claude Duvalier.

     Mr. Giuliani said he visited Haiti two weeks ago and met with several 
officials, including President Duvalier. "Political repression is not the 
major reason for leaving Haiti," Mr. Giuliani said. He said he reached that 
conclusion after Mr. Duvalier personally assured him that Haitians returning 
home from the United States were not persecuted.

     The suit charges that the Immigration and Naturalization Service has
     discriminated against the Haitians by illegally detaining them and 
denying
     them access to lawyers".



     Subj: [BRC-NEWS] All the Dictator's Men: Rudy Giuliani & Haitian
     Immigrants Date: 08/17/1999 2:03:17 AM Pacific Daylight Time From:
     mitchelcohen@mindspring.com (Mitchel Cohen) Sender:
     worker-brc-news@lists.tao.ca To: brc-news@lists.tao.ca
     http://YesRudy.com/rudyhaitifull.html

     All the Dictator's Men: Rudy Giuliani & Haitian Immigrants
     by Mitchel Cohen

     Rudy Giuliani's creation of a police state in New York City is becoming
     increasingly evident to those who live here. What most people do not 
know,
     and what has gone largely unreported, is Giuliani's record of anti-
     immigrant policing before becoming Mayor, particularly in regard to
     desperate "boat people" fleeing political repression in Haiti.

     In the early 1980s, the Miami-based Haitian Refugee Center filed a 
class
     action lawsuit seeking the release of 2,100 refugees fleeing 
persecution in
     Haiti, who had been captured at sea by the U.S. military and imprisoned 
in
     horrendous conditions at U.S. "detention centers." The case came to 
trial
     in April 1982. Arguing the Reagan administration's position in federal
     court as well as in the media against releasing the refugees was the
     Associate Attorney General of the United States at the time, Rudolph 
Giuliani.

     Many of the refugees had been tortured under Duvalier and were fleeing 
for
     their lives. But Giuliani argued that they had nothing to fear from
     Duvalier's "friendly" government, and urged that they be sent back --
     "repatriated," he termed it -- a squeaky clean word, assiduously 
scrubbed
     so that no blood leaks. Just two weeks earlier, Giuliani noted, he had
     personally met face-to-face with Baby Doc Duvalier to check out the
     situation. The dictator had "personally assured" him, he said, that
     political repression "simply does not exist" and that Haitians returned 
by
     the United States were not being persecuted. Giuliani cited Duvalier's
     personal assurance as proof that "political repression is not the major
     reason for leaving Haiti." (New York Times, April 3, 1982)

     Eight years earlier James Simms, head of the Haiti desk at the 
Department
     of State, had cited this same script word-for-word to justify U.S. 
policy
     at that time. Giuliani had memorized his lines well.

     According to attorney Arthur Helton, the Director of Immigrant Programs 
at
     the Open Society Institute in New York, Giuliani was "the key 
implementer
     and an ardent defender of the policy to return the refugees to Haiti." 
As
     Helton explains, "It is extremely unusual for such a high-ranking 
official
     as Giuliani, who was the top Justice Department official with a 
specific
     brief on immigration issues at that time, to personally argue such a 
case
     before the 11th Circuit Court."

     Giuliani -- the Number Three man at the Department of Justice -- 
feigned
     ignorance of dozens of stories in the newspapers documenting political
     repression in Haiti. Hundreds of Haitians were reporting, in explicit
     detail, being tortured. Account after account told of family members
     murdered before their eyes. Amnesty International, the Haitian Refugee
     Center, and a number of other human rights groups issued reports
     documenting hundreds of cases of political repression and torture in 
Haiti.
     In fact, Amnesty International had filed a well-publicized lawsuit on
     behalf of 10 Haitian trade union leaders who had, at that point, been
     locked up and tortured in Fort Dimanche -- the headquarters of the 
Tontons
     Macoutes death squads -- without trial for three years. Hundreds of
     similarly horrible tales of abuse, torture, imprisonment and murder 
were
     matters of public record. Yet as Associate U.S. Attorney, Giuliani
     unethically (and perhaps illegally) refused to take their depositions 
or
     investigate their stories.

     Giuliani dismissed those reports and ignored the lawsuit. In court, in 
the
     media, and in testimony before Congress Giuliani insisted that there 
was no
     persecution in Haiti and all was fine and proper there.

     Giuliani also failed to apprise the Department of Justice of his friend
     Duvalier's pimping of Haitian slaves to sugar magnates in the Dominican
     Republic -- a slave trade that Giuliani's beloved "interdiction" policy 
--
     another squeaky clean word -- had the effect of enforcing, because it
     prevented slaves from escaping by sea.

     After all, Duvalier had "personally assured" him that nothing was going 
on.
     Clearly, Giuliani latched onto the Haitian dictator's "personal 
assurance"
     to paper over the atrocities of the policy he was already espousing, 
just
     as he is doing today.

     As Giuliani later philosophized, "Freedom is not a concept in which 
people
     can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about
     authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being 
to
     cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do."
     (New York Times, March 17, 1994). In Haiti, Duvalier was that authority
     upon whom Giuliani had stamped his seal of approval. For Haitians to 
flee
     and to fight for their freedom -- then as well as now -- was an act 
that
     flew in the face of the authority Giuliani believed in and was paid to 
uphold.

     The Haitians, with a strong sense of history, likened their plight to 
that
     of the Jews fleeing Nazi Germany in the late 1930s. But Giuliani would 
have
     none of that. In September 1982 and on many occasions thereafter, 
Giuliani
     trudged back to federal court to fight against Federal District Judge
     Eugene Spellman's order releasing 1,800 Haitian refugees. Even after 
losing
     that round in court, Giuliani continued his fanatical fight to send the
     refugees back, many to their deaths, just as in 1939 the U.S. 
government
     had turned back the SS St. Louis, with 930 Jewish refugees aboard, who 
were
     fleeing Nazi Germany and attempting to enter the United States.

     Giuliani's attitude against immigrants from Haiti was very much on 
display
     last year during the NYPD's torture of Haitian immigrant Abner Louima. 
It
     was again on display in the Mayor's sarcastic dismissal of Amnesty
     International's recent report concerning rampant police brutality in 
New
     York City, particularly against immigrants and people of color, as well 
as
     poor and working class whites. And now, again, we see the Mayor's 
vicious
     and authoritarian disposition towards our communities in his defense of 
the
     police who murdered Amadou Diallo, an immigrant from Guinea.

     What is the one thing Giuliani says he learned from the Diallo murder? 
If
     NY police were allowed to use hollow-point bullets, poor Amadou would 
have
     died immediately and rendered unnecessary the remaining 39 gunshots.

     Fascism has long fingers. In Guiliani's case, it didn't begin when he
     became Mayor. His fascism goes back a long way. Our fight is not only
     around this particular instance of police brutality but against a whole
     system, a whole way of thinking of which Giuliani is the current 
incarnation.

     Copyright (c) 1999 Mitchel Cohen. All rights reserved.
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