20264: radtimes: Horror Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: radtimes <resist@best.com>

Horror Haiti

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12546

By Bill West
FrontPageMagazine.com | March 11, 2004

Less than two months ago the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE) arrested and deported Jean-Claude Duperval, a former Haitian army
general and a US Court-designated human rights persecutor, who was wanted
for mass murder in Haiti. These alleged acts stemmed from the tyranny
imposed on the Haitian populace by the military regime that ousted
democratically elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Duperval was the
last of the infamous "Haitian Three" human rights violators, all former
Haitian military officers, wanted for their involvement in committing
atrocities in Haiti while in power. The other two, former Colonel Carl
Dorelien and former Lt. Colonel Herbert Valmond, had been previously
arrested and deported by the INS in Miami and, like Duperval, were being
held in the Haitian National Prison awaiting further judicial proceedings
in that country. That is, until now.

Recent events in Haiti make it unclear what the future holds for the
"Haitian Three" and at least a dozen lower level Haitian persecutors who
were arrested and deported from the US over the past three years. The
arrests, which occurred in South Florida under what had been the INS' Miami
District's aggressive and successful human rights persecutor apprehension
program, were the precursor to the ICE's national level Operation No Safe
Haven. The so-called rebels who have allegedly liberated Haiti from
Aristide are mainly former Haitian army members and operatives of what had
been the Front for Advancement and Progress in Haiti (FRAPH), a
"paramilitary" organization aligned with corrupt military officials whose
primary mission was to kidnap, torture and murder political opponents.
These are now the "liberators" of a country where even the elected
president, Aristide, by almost everyone's account, was at best completely
incapable of effectively governing anywhere outside the boundaries of his
own presidential palace, and at worst not much better than the dictators he
replaced.

 From any perspective--political, economic, or social--Haiti is in terrible
shape. It is a country incapable of supporting itself agriculturally, or
otherwise economically, and it is strategically situated in a high-density
drug trafficking corridor. It doesn't take much to understand why
corruption among Haitian government officials has been rampant at every
level for a very long time. It is also clear why Haiti has been a magnet
for every variation of smuggler, pirate, and thug who happens to ply the
Caribbean. All of this adds up to a long-term human rights disaster for the
Haitian people. Abject poverty, corrupt government (even when it's
democratically elected), the barest minimum of law enforcement and judicial
authority, a steady flow of external dirty money and arms, and a virtually
unchecked and often officially sanctioned "rule of the street gang," has
given the Western hemisphere what it now has--a nation is name only, with
seven million people, most of whom are uneducated, hungry, in constant
danger and fear, and who are always at risk of being the victims of the
next group of tyrants and their henchmen.

The leaders of the so-called rebels who, for the moment, tenuously hold
whatever reign of power exists in Haiti are former colleagues of the
notorious "Haitian Three." Reports from the Haitian capital the day after
Aristide fled indicated prison guards exchanged their uniforms for civilian
clothes and allowed the inmates to flee. It's unknown at this point if any
or all of the "Three" may have been among those fleeing inmates. Given the
fast changing situation on the ground in Haiti, yesterday's war criminal
could be tomorrow's prime minister. Hopefully, the developing international
security forces will not allow that to happen; but it is not entirely clear
yet who will really be in charge. In the event Duperval, Dorelien, or
Valmond were to be free and become aligned with an evolving transitional
government, either overtly or behind the scenes, that could spell disaster
for anyone in country who had in any way had crossed them. Even with that
Troika of Terror free, but on the lam hiding from international
peacekeepers, they would have powerful allies among the well-armed and
well-placed thugs within Haitian society and they could wreak no small
amount of havoc, if they so chose. An important question to be quickly
answered is, "Where are the 'Three'?"

Haiti had only a couple of years of anything resembling hope. It was
immediately after Aristide's return to power in 1994 by the efforts of the
US military intervention and the influx of large-scale international aide.
Ironically, the one shining example of Haitian judicial process was the
trial of the Raboteau massacre defendants, which included Duperval,
Dorelien, and Valmond, who were convicted in absentia (because they were
illegally in the US, facing deportation) but guaranteed new trials if they
returned to Haiti. The trial, covered by the international media and
scrupulously monitored by international legal observers, was hailed as
eminently fair and a tribute to due process and a milestone for the Haitian
judicial system. For a time, the Haitian National Police, under the
tutelage of US police advisers, was in the process of becoming something
that passed for a police force instead of a force of armed thugs. For
political reasons, the US pulled out of Haiti within a few short years of
the 1994 intervention. Without the American military, police and judicial
advisers, the institutional degeneration of the police and criminal justice
system quickly set in and the corruption spread even more quickly. Somewhat
amazingly, relative to the human rights persecutor suspects, the US was
able to continue the deportation process to Haiti almost to the end of the
Aristide regime, as evidenced by the Duperval removal.

However, in the current chaos that now exists in Haiti, three issues
relative to human rights violators should be considered by the United
States and international forces about to embark on yet another
stabilization and nation building mission in that beleaguered country. 1)
Account for the likes of Duperval, Dorelien and Valmond and the several
lower level military and paramilitary operatives who had been deported from
the US as persecutors and detained by Haitian authorities. 2) Recognize the
"rebellion" and the ensuing period of occupation itself will likely result
in Haitians committing atrocities against other Haitians and establish
investigative mechanisms to deal with such matters once reasonable security
and stability are reached. 3) Incorporate, to the extent possible, the
ability to investigate and prosecute human rights violations within the
framework of whatever new government is established in Haiti. These
atrocities are a dark but integral part of Haiti's modern history. If
Haitians are to have any hope of emerging from the evil and despair that
has engulfed their nation for so long, confronting their own terror
monsters with genuine and lasting justice must be done. Hopefully, the
United States and the international community will help that pitiful land
do just that.

Bill West retired as the Chief of the National Security Section for the INS
in Miami, Florida and is now a consultant for the Investigative Project, a
Washington DC-based counterterrorism research institute.

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