22296: erzilidanto: Another Flag Day report _ U.S. Marines preside over Haiti massacre (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Erzilidanto@aol.com

Posted at: Radtimes <resist@best.com>

U.S. Marines preside over Haiti massacre


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

Via Workers World News Service

Reprinted from the June 3, 2004

issue of Workers World newspaper

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


HAITIANS PROTEST FLAG DAY: U.S. MARINES PRESIDE OVER MASSACRE


By G. Dunkel


May 18 is Flag Day in Haiti. The holiday marks Jean-Jacques Dessalines'

creation of the Haitian flag 201 years ago during the final struggle

against the French slave masters. This year it was the occasion for a

major outpouring of protest against the Feb. 29 coup that ousted

President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the ongoing U.S.-French occupation.


In Port-au-Prince, thousands of people gathered in the poor neighborhood

of Belair starting at 8 o'clock in the morning. By 9:45 they were

marching from the Per petual Church toward the Champ de Mars, a park in

front of the Presidential Palace. They sang "Liberty or death" (Libète

ou lamò), the slogan that Dessalines adopted along with the flag, and

chanted "Return our elected president Jean-Bertrand."


Marchers also denounced rampant infla tion, cuts in wages, and witch hunts

against Aristide supporters by the former military and FRAPH death squad

members.


Within a few blocks they met a line of Haitian National Police (PNH)

backed up by U.S. Marines with heavy machine guns and armored personnel

carriers. The cops fired tear gas and bullets into the air, and then at

the protesters. At least one protester, Saintus "Titus" Simpson, was

shot in the head and died.


The demonstrators retreated and broke into smaller groups, spreading out

to the poorer sections of the capital. Soon contingents had gathered in

Solino, Fort National and Lalue, as well as Belair, and headed again

toward the Champ de Mars. The protests continued into the evening, with

more casualties.


Marguerite Laurent of the Haitian Lawyers Leadership, citing sources at

the scene, said police killed at least four demonstrators. Radio Ginen,

a local station in Port-au-Prince, said it had reports of at least nine

demonstrators killed.


According to Laurent, "One woman seized the fourth body that fell next

to her, refused to give it to the Marines. She removed all her clothes

to show she had no weapons while Marines surrounded her at gunpoint as

she cursed in Creole, calling on the revolutionary ancestors, and

shouted 'Liberte ou lamo!' She picked up the dead body herself and put

it on her bare back, daring the Marines to kill her also while she

carried it away.


"Reportedly, the 'blan' [white soldiers] looked at each other, shook

their heads and backed off, letting her carry the body, which she

wrapped around her naked torso in a huge blue and red Haitian flag."


Haiti Progress newspaper reported some demonstrators started chanting

"Sèl solisyon se yon revolisyon" ("The sole solution is a revolution")

as the day wore on because it's impossible to celebrate Haiti's Flag Day

or have an election under occupation.


U.S. Marines and the PNH claimed this was an illegal demonstration. But

protest organizers from Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas party had a sealed and

dated permit.


The role of the U.S. Marines was key. A march participant said, "It's

unbelievable how the U.S. Marines stood in the background sometimes as

the disbanded soldiers and FRAPH soldiers, now in the police,

slaughtered the marchers. If they [the Marines] weren't there, the

people would take down the hated soldiers and take back their country."


Laurent said that many marchers believed that the violent arrest of

popular singer and Aristide supporter Sò Ann (Annette Auguste) in the

early hours of May 10 was calculated to stop the May 18 march from

taking place.


At 12:30 a.m., a Special Forces squad of approximately 20 U.S. Marines

executed a military assault on the home of this 69-year-old grandmother,

who just left the hospital. All 11 people in the house, including Sò

Ann's 5-year-old grandchild, were hooded, handcuffed and forced to lie

on the ground while Marines ransacked the house.

*********
Forwarded by the Haitian Lawyers Leadership
******
"Men anpil chaj pa lou"  is Kreyol for - "Many hands make light a heavy load."

See, The Haitian Leadership Networks'  7 "men anpil chaj pa

lou" campaigns to help restore Haiti's independence, the will of the mass
electorate and the rule of law. See,
http://www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/haitianlawyers.html ; http://www.margueritelaurent.com/campaigns/campaigns.html

and Haitiaction.net

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