19422: Bush's UN Security Council to Haiti: Sorry, Won't help you (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Anthony Fenton <apfenton@ualberta.ca>

February 28, 2004

http://www.dominionpaper.ca

Bush's UN Security Council to Haiti: Sorry, Won't help you

By Anthony Fenton

February 28, 2004

Yesterday George Bush announced that Haiti’s democratically elected
President Aristide should step down if he knows what’s good for him. As
such, the blame for the so-called “political impasse” is placed squarely
on Aristide’s shoulders, despite the fact that he has repeatedly agreed to
capitulate to the US, CARICOM and OAS ‘Plan of Action’. The real problem
remains the refusal on the part of the opposition to negotiate with Aristide,
a steadfast refusal that they have irrationally made for four years with the
backing of recycled Reagan and Bush I acolytes.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rather than condemn the opposition, which represents no more that 12
per cent of the popular constituency, the Bush administration continues to
support them, as they have been doing all along, financially and
otherwise. Many writers such as Tom Reeves, Kevin Pina, COHA, and an
increasing number of alternative media outlets, have seen this developing
and have accurately predicted the current outcome. In the context of the
recent emergency UN Security Council meeting on Haiti, the results were
no less predictable.

The international corporate press has decided to withhold the fact that
several of the thirty member-states to address the UN Security Council
had the courage to unequivocally support the urgent appeals made by
Jamaica and the Bahamas on behalf of CARICOM for the urgent
deployment of UN forces to Haiti. [1]

Out of the thirty countries, only the EU, Britain, China, and Canada were
clear in their support for the actual line of unilateralist double-speak that
is
being pursued by the United States. More than half of the countries openly
supported Haiti and the CARICOM appeal for UN intervention, while there
were nine whose comments implied a position of fence-sitting.

>From the report, a recap of CARICOM’s appeal:

“the CARICOM member States sought the direct and immediate
intervention of the United Nations in Haiti, [Jamaica’s Keith Desmond
Knight] stated. The situation was one of utmost urgency, and the need for
decisive action was paramount. The immediate need now was for the
Council to authorize the urgent deployment of a multinational force to
assist in the restoration of law and order, to facilitate a return to
stability
and to create an environment in which efforts to find a solution to the
political crisis could be pursued.”

Jamaica’s Knight made it explicit that sides were not being chosen by
virtue of this appeal:

“He stressed that CARICOM’s stand on the issue was not driven by any
desire to promote the political interests of any particular personality in the
Haiti political arena but was based on the need to remain faithful to
democratic principle and the integrity of a constitutional order.”

The Philippines also put this in no uncertain terms, stating that to ignore
Haiti’s pleas for assistance demonstrates that the United Nations is
willing to “abdicate its responsibility”, as laid out in the UN Charter, to
crisis stricken member states.

The rhetoric that accommodates the maintained commitment to seeking
a “political settlement” [Bush doublespeak for “regime change”] is
uniformly applied by *coalition* countries such as Canada, Britain, and
the EU. Allan Rock, speaking for Canada, demonstrated the efficacy of
this rhetoric, which says so much while saying so little.

Rock’s opening statement was that “the international community could
not solve Haiti's problems.” Indeed, it can only create and foment them by
refusing to defend Haiti's democratic institutions at all costs. Rock’s last
words were as telling as his first, speaking in the context of the OAS
mission: “That mission, however, could not achieve its goals in conditions
of anarchy.” Denial of Canada’s role in bringing about “conditions of
anarchy” is herein implicitly advanced.

To a considerable degree, Canada appears to be making up for “missed
opportunities” in Iraq by demonstrating that like a good lapdog, they will
uncritically support regime change in Haiti. Canadian civil society, many of
whom have been making noise about Canada’s moves toward “deep
integration” with US foreign, economic, and military policy, as though it is
a thing of the future, would do well to more closely consider the events
that are unfolding in Haiti, and the commitment that Canada’s government
has made therein. [2]

As stated elsewhere, Canada’s foreign policy has gone unquestioned by
the corporate media, who have instead made significant contributions to
the demonization of Aristide. [3]

Overall, the Canadian media has at the very least paved the way for the
latest instalment of Bush doctrine to pass under the radar of public
awareness in Canada. These efforts of course are themselves built on an
edifice of distortion and disinformation, as created by the AP and Reuters.

Innumerable concrete facts about this have been circulating amongst the
mostly internet-based alternative press, which has done an excellent job
of exposing these crimes against humanity.[4] Only the occasional sane
piece has found its way into the mainstream press, though in a sea of
insanity, one has to note the negligible impact that this has on the
corporate context of lies and distortion. [5] This is no reason to stop
trying,
especially since the Bush doctrine shows no signs of letting up going into
a weekend that might determine Haiti’s future – and catastrophically at
that.

This doctrine, incidentally, also includes the “retrieval” by the Coast Guard
of all refugees found to be fleeing Haiti for America. Currently, there are
over 500 Haitian refugees being held aboard Coast Guard cutters,
awaiting their fate. And for those who dare to try and cross into the
Dominican Republic will find over a thousand elite US-trained forces,
recently returned from their ‘coalition’ stint in Iraq, who will be shoring up
the border to prevent any ill-conceived exodus away from the armed terror
that is now likely to ensue, short of a “political solution”. [5]

Since it has been predicted recently by Kevin Pina [in Haiti] that it is not
only Aristide that is targeted by the terrorists – this would be naïve to
posit
– but all Lavalas faithful, this means that thousands upon thousands of
lives are at stake. [6]
This plausibility has been noted recently by Human Rights Watch and
numerous other international humanitarian groups. [7]

Bush’s statements on Haitian refugees are very revealing to the extent
that they are a clear violation of article 33 of the 1951 Refugee Convention,
the basis upon which the UN High Commissioner for Refugees is “calling
on governments in the region to respond humanely to any Haitians
seeking asylum because of the current turmoil.” [8]

The US Committee for Refugees had this to say, conveying sentiments
also shared by HRW and Amnesty International:

"Our President has finally spoken the truth about American practice
toward Haitian refugees…For years we have witnessed the unfair,
discriminatory treatment of Haitian refugees, but now the President is
publicly admitting that the U.S. does not obey international law.” [9]

Aristide must go, Haitians must stay, and the largely empathetic
international community must have their good intentions suppressed. The
only thing sustaining the “silent coup” being perpetrated by the US,
Canada, the EU and murderous members of Haiti’s former military and
‘political’ opposition, is our silence on this issue. The current crisis in
Haiti affords us as clear a view as has been historically available - of
US-led crimes against humanity currently being perpetrated in our name.
Our silence accepts the theft of Haiti’s right to self-determination. Our
silence approves of genocide. This, while our moral superiority precludes
our mobilization against these horrendous crimes.

There are alternatives to this grim picture. We can learn to appreciate the
realities as they exist in Haiti, and through this the realities as they exist
in
our immediate lives. We can then be in an empowering position to alter
the conditions that allow Haiti to be a dumping ground for our misdeeds. If
we cannot appreciate that we are fearful of truly seeing Haiti for what Haiti
really is, then we will never see in Haiti our own reflection – full of grief
–
staring right back at us. The calculus is quite clear: we have trashed Haiti
for 200 years. The culmination of these 200 years is beseeching us to
acknowledge its reality. Come what may, we will face up to this reality.
Whether or not this happens on our terms is up to us to decide. Either
way, Haiti remains at our mercy.

Note:
[1] All UN News Releases obtained at http://www,reliefweb.int and
http://www.unwire.org/. For mainstream coverage of UNSC/8011 see AP
and Reuters, February 26, 2004.

[2] See the Council of Canadians at http://www.canadians.org, and the
Polaris Institute at http://www.polarisinstitue.org in particular, leaders
amongst Canadian civil society. Neither have made statements
concerning the crisis of "deep integration" or "Fortress North America" as
it concerns Haiti.
http://globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040227.wwiwa28/BNStor
y/International/

[3] See Fenton's "Media vs. Reality in Haiti at:
http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=54&ItemID=4977
See also Fenton and Dru Oja Jay's "Haiti: Five Facts and an Appeal" at:
http://www.dominionpaper.ca/haiti.

[4] For just a few excellent examples of this see:
http://www.dominionpaper.ca; http://www.indymedia.org;
http://www.wsws.org; http://www.cpcml.ca/tmld/D34026.htm#1;
http://www.blackcommentator.com

[5] For Dominican context see: http://www.dr1.com/#2

[6] Interview, February 25, 2004.

[7] See: http://www.reliefweb.int, press releases Feb. 27, 2004.

[8] See: UN News Service, Feb. 26, 04. http://www.unwire.org

[9] http://www.refugees.org/news/press_releases/2004/022604.cfm
posted by anthony_fenton in international news