22962: This Week in Haiti 22:22 8/11/2004 (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

"This Week in Haiti" is the English section of HAITI PROGRES
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                           HAITI PROGRES
              "Le journal qui offre une alternative"

                      * THIS WEEK IN HAITI *

                        August 11 - 17, 2004
                            Vol. 22, No. 22

CRIME RATE SOARS AS POLICE PREPARE TO STRIKE

Haiti has seen a violent crime wave of unprecedented proportions
in recent weeks. The grave state of affairs was the subject of an
Aug. 2 New York Times article entitled "Five Months After
Aristide, Mayhem Rules the Streets."

Correspondent Michael Kamber reported from Cap Haïtien that
"mayhem is reaching ever higher levels, with murders, rapes and
bus robberies becoming routine." He writes "a tense inertia
has spread over efforts to police this shattered society,
allowing armed factions and marauders to move in."

This is largely because the former soldiers making up most of the
"rebels" who helped overthrow President Jean-Bertrand Aristide on
Feb. 29 have neutralized the remnants of Haiti's police force,
which in turn is mostly unarmed, unmotivated and underpaid.

Furthermore, the "rebels" set free almost all of Haiti's
convicted criminals as they took over towns.

Now crimes are not just more numerous but more gruesome.
Dismembered bodies are turning up all over the country. For
example, in Caperlier, near Petit-Goâve, on Aug. 4 peasants
discovered the chopped up remains of a man named Toutou Gaillard.
The same day, in the Artibonite town of Gros Morne, the body of a
young woman without legs was found near a river. Her face was too
mutilated to identify her.

Another body was found in the same condition on Jul. 27 in Belle-
Fontaine near Croix-des-Bouquets. "Heavily armed bandits came
into the area yesterday morning and proceeded directly to the
home of Ti Betiz," said Célestin Jean Victor, the coordinator of
a local peasant organization. "They killed him by decapitating
him and taking away the head, leaving behind the body with the
arms amputated. During the same day, the same individuals went to
Grande-Savanne where they shot a certain Jacquelin, leaving him
for dead."

On July 30 in Gonaïves, four men on motorcycles ambushed a car
driven by businessman Bernard Douze, the owner of the city's Shell
gas station. Before being riddled with bullets, Douze veered his
vehicle wildly and plowed into a group of market women, killing
three of them and injuring several others.

On the desolate stretch of highway north of the capital near
Morne Cabrit on National Road 3, armed bandits leisurely hold up
motorists and buses without any interference from the de facto
authorities.

In the capital, the situation is also bad. On July 27, people in
the Delmas 33 neighborhood discovered the body of Jocelyn Saint-
Louis, a former deputy from St. Raphaël. On the evening of August
4, Guy Solon, a popular organization member said to be close to
Aristide's Lavalas Family party, was gunned down in Delmas 19 by
men in the back of a pick-up truck.

In some areas, people have taken matters into their own hands. In
the northeast commune of Monbin-Crochu, peasants lynched three
suspected thieves on the night of Jul. 29. The peasants said they
have no choice but to organize aggressive self-defense brigades
with no authorities in the region.

Meanwhile, the Haitian police are threatening to strike for a
100% pay increase that they were promised in June. De facto
police chief Léon Charles told the policemen that they should be
satisfied for the time being with the 30% hike that the
government is now offering. Charles said that police officers who
strike will be fired.

Last week, Haiti's former soldiers gave the de facto government a
deadline of Aug. 10 to formally reconstitute them as the Haitian
army and give them 10 years back pay. As the deadline elapsed,
Rony Bernard, the spokesman for former soldiers in southern
Haiti, said that a contingent of 150 former soldiers from the
south would go to the central plateau town of Pernal, a former
"rebel" stronghold, to "receive instructions" about how to force
the government to give them back pay, according to the Haitian
Press Agency.

On Aug. 9, former soldiers dressed in white T-shirts saying
FAd'H, the acronym for the disbanded Armed Forces of Haiti,
marched in Cap Haïtien. "If they want our weapons, they have to
resign first," the former soldiers declared to the de facto
government which has called on them to disarm by Sep. 15 (see
Haïti Progrès, Vol. 22, No. 20, 7/28/2004). The former soldiers
say, with some justice, that their weapons put the de facto
government in power. "Down with ingratitude!" they shouted.

ACTIVISTS ACROSS U.S. LAUNCH WEEK OF SUPPORT FOR NON-VIOLENT
DEMONSTRATIONS IN HAITI
by the Haiti Action Committee

Beginning a week of non-violent demonstrations in the United
States, representatives of the Bay Area-based Haiti Action
Committee today called for people of conscience to support the
Haitian people's ongoing struggle for basic freedoms. The U.S.
actions are in support of peaceful protests being staged under
dire conditions in Haiti.

The Haiti demonstrations will be held in the area of Cap-Haïtien
and Milot in the North of Haiti from August 12 to14. That region
has seen brutal crackdowns on the popular mass movement Lavalas
by paramilitary forces. Meanwhile, candlelight vigils, pickets
and teach-ins are planned in various U.S. cities in solidarity
with Haiti.

Robert Roth, a San Francisco educator who just returned from
visiting Milot with a human rights delegation to Haiti, said,
"The democratically-elected mayor of Milot, Jean-Charles Moïse,
is now in hiding after soldiers stormed his home in the middle of
the night on June 14, in violation of the constitution, which
forbids late-night raids of this kind."

In 1998, Mayor Moïse visited California, where he was received by
the Board of Supervisors of Alameda County and the mayors and
City Council members of Oakland, Berkeley and Davis. These cities
proclaimed a day in Mayor Moïse's honor, recognizing his
extraordinary contribution to the Haitian people s struggle for
justice and democracy.

A candlelight march to demand an end to the persecution of Mayor
Moïse and other Lavalas members, and the return of President
Aristide, will take place at 9 p.m. on Friday, August 13,
starting from the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists
at the corner of Cedar and Bonita in North Berkeley. A public
forum, featuring Haitian community leader Pierre Labossière and
media activist Maria Gilardin, will precede the vigil at 7 p.m.
at the church.

Actions in Cap-Haïtien and Milot will include a "Caravan of
Justice," in which people will place candles at sites of military
attacks on civilians. This cycle of protest will conclude with a
march on August 14, commemorating the beginning of the Haitian
Revolution in 1791. Due to the extreme repression in the region,
international human rights observers will monitor the protests
and help insure safety of participants.

Pierre Labossière of the Haiti Action Committee called on U.S.
residents to pressure their Representatives to support H.R. 3919,
The Responsibility to Uncover the Truth About Haiti, or
T.R.U.T.H. Act. Introduced by Congresswoman Barbara Lee, the bill
calls for an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the
Bush Administration's involvement in the February 29, 2004 coup
d'état in Haiti.

On February 29, representatives of the Bush Administration
kidnapped the democratically elected president of Haiti,
Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and flew him to the Central African
Republic. President Aristide now lives in involuntary exile in
South Africa. The Haitian people overwhelmingly elected him
twice, only to see both terms of office brutally interrupted by
military coups.

President Aristide s ouster was the culmination of a U.S.-led
destabilization campaign which included withholding of loans,
funding of political opposition groups, and arming and training
of former military officials and death squad leaders.

Since the military insurgency began in late January, militias
have murdered thousands of people, burned hundreds of homes, and
forced tens of thousands of activists in President Aristide's
Fanmi Lavalas Party to flee for their lives. Food prices have
skyrocketed, with the price of rice doubling, creating an
unspeakably horrible situation for the overwhelming majority of
Haitians.

An occupation force led by the United States, France, Canada, and
Chile replaced Haiti's legal government and installed as
President a Haitian exile, Gérard Latortue, a resident of
Florida, who had not set foot in Haiti for 15 years. UN
"peacekeepers" lend undeserved legitimacy to the coup government.
Former military officials currently control the police, while
formerly exiled and jailed death squad leaders again spread
terror.

The U.S.-engineered coup in Haiti is in clear violation of U.S.
and international law. The Caribbean CARICOM countries and Africa
Union have repeatedly condemned this removal of Haiti's
democratically elected President.

For further information, visit  www.haitiaction.net or contact:
Pierre Labossière pierre@haitiaction.net, Robert Roth
415-297-7869, <mirk1@mindspring.com>, Leslie Fleming
510-558-0371, <lesliefleming@mindspring.com>.

All articles copyrighted Haiti Progres, Inc. REPRINTS ENCOURAGED.
Please credit Haiti Progres.

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