19039: White: Jennifer Harbury: STOP THE RETURN OF THE TORTURERS IN HAITI (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Randall White <raw@haitiaction.org>

Dear Friends,

We have forwarded this urgent action call from
human rights attorney Jennifer Harbury in order
to keep the pressure on the U.S. State
Department.  Jennifer speaks the truth about the
opposition, the FRAPH and military actions in
Haiti.  Please respond ASAP.

Also, please spread the work about the emergency
demonstration on Th, 26 Feb, 3-5 p.m. at the SF
Federal Building.

HAC

URGENT ACTION : STOP THE RETURN OF THE TORTURERS IN HAITI

To: All Supporters of the Torture Abolition Network

From: Jennifer Harbury



Dear Friends:

We urgently need your support and telephone calls
on the growing crisis in Haiti. I am sure you
have all seen the recent press articles about
what is described as the popular unrest there,
but far more than civil disobedience is at stake
now. We are looking at yet another grab for power
by the same death squads that ravaged Haiti a few
years ago.

The self proclaimed uprising has been extremely
violent and people are dying. While members of
the political opposition are indeed part of this
uprising, so too are many of the most notorious
torturers and death squad members who devastated
Haiti before Aristideís return to power. When we
remember that FRAPH and many other military human
rights violators were in fact backed by the CIA
in those years, the recent insinuations by U.S.
officials that they would not oppose an ouster of
President Aristide take on a rather sinister
light. Mr. Aristide was legally and popularly
elected by the people of Haiti not once, but
twice, in the more recent elections by 92% of the
vote. (The claims of electoral error arose in a
senate election, not his presidential victory).
Why are we suggesting that he leave office or
accept U.S.- dictated changes in his policies?

The opposition demonstrators have seized the town
of Gonaives, killing more than 50 people the
first week, including three hospital patients and
14 policemen who were mutilated and dragged
through the streets. A number of key roads and a
bridge have been obstructed, preventing the
arrival of badly needed medical personnel as well
as humanitarian supplies. According to reports,
the ìResistanceî has proclaimed that anyone not
supporting the overthrow of Aristide would be
attacked. They backed up this threat with
beatings and killings, and destroyed several
homes, two of which happened to belong to the
survivors of the Raboteau massacre. (In 1994 the
army and paramilitary troops had entered
Raboteau, shooting, beating and arresting people
in masses. As the people fled towards the harbor
to swim to safety, they encountered armed men on
the beachfront, who opened fire on them.
Undeterred, the people of Raboteau pressed their
human rights case through trial, winning a
verdict against 16 of the 22 defendants despite
the U.S. refusal to hand over thousands of FRAPH
documents).

Two of the opposition leaders reported to have
engaged in killings of police officers in Haitiís
Central Plateau, include Guy Philippe, a
U.S.-trained former Haitian soldier who has
attempted at least three coups in the last four
years, and Louis Jodel Chamblain, the #2 ranked
leader of the notorious CIA-backed FRAPH death
squad. Chamblain was convicted in both the
assassination of Antoine Izmery, a pro-democracy
businessman in 1993, and the 1994 Raboteau
massacre. Jean Pierre, alias Tatoune, was a local
FRAPH leader and was serving a life sentence for
the Raboteau massacre, until his escape in a 2002
jailbreak. The opposition also includes civilians
like sweat shop owner and U.S. citizen Andy
Apaid, who opposed an increase of the minimum
wage last year, when Aristide attempted to raise
it from the $1.60 per day where it now stands.

Since so many of the more brutal members of the
ìoppositionî in fact have long standing ties to
the U.S. intelligence community, we should be
calling off our dogs instead of pressing Aristide
to bend his policies to U.S. demands.

Haiti really does not need the FRAPH or other
death squads, let alone the CIA, to interfere
with a lawfully elected government, let alone to
return to power for a new round of blood baths.
Who can forget the massacre in the Saint-Jean
Bosco Church of 1988, which took place as
Aristide was giving his Sunday mass? Thugs and
secret police broke down the church doors and
opened fire, attacking and stabbing the people as
they prayed. A pregnant woman was stabbed through
the stomach, more than a dozen others were
killed, many more badly hurt, and the Church was
burned to the ground. Miraculously Aristide
survived, became President, survived a violent
coup, and became President yet again.

The people of Haiti have spoken clearly enough
about their choice of their national leader.
There are no masses of refugees fleeing Aristide
as there were under Duvalier and the FRAPH. We
should respect this choice instead of supporting
yet more terror.



PLEASE CALL OR WRITE THE STATE DEPARTMENT, HAITI DESK:

TEL. 202-736-4628.



Tell Them:

1.     The United States should fully support any
legally and popularly elected government,
including that of Jean-Bertrand Aristide,
President of Haiti..

2.     Because many of the persons involved in
the current violence by the opposition, were in
fact death squad members and extreme human rights
violators, with long standing links to the U.S.
intelligence services, the U.S. government should
take all steps possible to control these assets
and allies, and require the immediate cessation
of violence and intimidation on their part. Any
and all covert funding to them should be halted
forthwith.

3.     The U.S. government should respect and
comply with any request by President Aristide for
reasonable assistance to his understaffed and
under-equipped police force.

4.	The U.S. should respect the sovereign
status of the government of Haiti and not
interfere in the socio-economic policies of that
country by threatened intervention or sanctions
of any kind.



If you wish to make additional calls, please give
your support and thanks to Maxine Waters, and ask
for help from other allies and friends on the
Hill, such as Sen. Leahy, Sen. Dodd, Rep.
Conyers, Rep. Rangel, and Rep. Lantos. The
Switchboard number is 202-224-3121.

Thank you everyone. Your calls do make a difference, and always have.

Abrazos,

Jennifer







U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT Contact Information:

Colin Powell, U.S. Secretary of State
Fax:         202.647.2283 or 202.647.5169
Phone:     202.647.5291 or 202.647.7098

Mail:        U.S. Department of State

2201 C Street NW

Washington, DC 20520
E-mail: via
<http://contact-us.state.gov/ask_form_cat/ask_form_secretary.html>http://contact-us.state.gov/ask_form_cat/ask_form_secretary.html
Haiti Desk Officers, U.S. State Department:
   Joseph Tilghman
   Fax:       202.647.2901
   Phone:   202.647.5088
   email:
<http://us.f112.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=tilghmanjf@state.gov&YY=85691&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b>tilghmanjf@state.gov

  Lawrence Connell
   Fax:       202.647.2901
   Phone:   202.647.6765
   email:     unknown


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