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International Action Center<br>
Founded by Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark<br>
39 W. 14th St., NY, NY, 10011 212-633-6646,
<a href="http://www.iacenter.org/" eudora="autourl">www.iacenter.org</a><br><br>
A Message from Ramsey Clark<br>
March 1, 2004<br><br>
The Bush administration has worked towards the removal of President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide from office for three years. It has enforced a
unilateral embargo and cut off humanitarian aid to the poorest country in
the hemisphere. It has sought to undermine support for President Aristide
while supporting his opposition. It has waged a relentless propaganda
campaign to force him out of office. It has supported calls for elections
in violation of the constitution and laws of Haiti.<br><br>
Most recently the U.S. has forced regime change by armed aggression
supporting former Haitian military officers, FRAPH leaders and criminal
elements who entered Haiti with heavy firepower. Though only hundreds in
number they easily captured Cap Haitien, Gonaives, Hinche and Les Cayes,
killing the police who were untrained in warfare, or in defending against
commando units, armed only with pistols.<br><br>
This small force could never have entered Haiti if President Aristide, a
man of peace, had not abolished the Haitian army, a praiseworthy act.
Unfortunately, this left the country defenseless against armed
aggression.<br><br>
The international organizations, CARICOM, OAS and the UN should have
acted to protect the democratically elected government of Haiti. After
Costa Rica abolished its army, President Somoza (who U.S. President
Franklin Roosevelt called "our SOB") of Nicaragua, twice
threatened invasions of Costa Rica, only to be stopped, once by the OAS
and once by Venezuela.<br><br>
The U.S. consistently acted to force President Aristide to leave Haiti,
abandon his constitutional duties, repudiate democratic processes and
desert his people to the tender mercies of the Old Regime. The army, the
paramilitary FRAPH, criminal gangs and the old oligarchy that supported
Duvalier terrorism against the Haitian people with U.S. support for 30
years. When in 1986 Baby Doc Duvalier was forced to leave, his repressive
forces no longer able to contain the anger of the people, it was in a
U.S. Air Force plane to the French Riviera with millions of dollars wrung
from the sweat of the poor people of Haiti.<br><br>
President Aristide consistently refused to leave his people, to resign,
to subvert Haitian democracy and constitutional government under enormous
pressure from the Bush Administration. He was under that enormous
pressure for months as violence was again threatening his presidency as
it did in 1991, nine months into his first term as the first
democratically elected president of Haiti, the first and only country in
which a successful slave rebellion took place. That revolution was begun
by Toussaint Louverteur in 1791 and ended under Jean-Jacques Dessalines
and others who defeated Napoleon's legions, 20,000 strong, and win
independence for Haiti in 1804. <br>
In his autobiography published in exile in 1992 first in France, Aristide
wrote, "In Haiti, we are watching the ascent of a rebellious people
who are revolting against slavery. I am only the reflection, an echo of
that movement?they are the principal actors. I simply try to exist in
their dimension, to show love and non-violence, through and beyond all
the difficulties of life, as the only thing that will enable us to go
forward."<br><br>
President Aristide listed in the final chapter of his autobiography,
"The Ten Commandments of Democracy in Haiti," first spoken by
him before the General Assembly of the United Nations in September 1991.
The commandments of President Aristide, the political faith of a priest,
scholar and person of, by and for the poor, included: liberty; democracy;
fidelity to human rights; the right to eat and to work; defense of the
Haitian diaspora; no to violence; fidelity to the human being ―
and the highest form of wealth ― fidelity to Haitian culture;
everyone around the same table.<br><br>
This is the man President Bush has deposed.<br><br>
If the Bush administration policy of unilateral wars of aggression,
violations of international law and the U.S. Constitution and regime
change is to be stopped before the U.S. loses its last friend and creates
a wave of terrorism that will engulf the planet for years, the U.S.
Congress must investigate: 1. The role of the U.S. in forcing President
Aristide from Haiti 2. The support the Bush administration gave in
training, financing and arming the aggression against Haiti 3. The acts
the Bush administration took to destabilize social order in Haiti, to
support the old army, the FRAPH and the wealthy oligarchies 4. The role
the U.S. played in President Aristide's sudden departure from Haiti,
contrary to all his public statements, and his transport to a distant
country 5. Any explanation the Bush administration has for its failure to
demand the former military, FRAPH and other violent groups lay down their
arms, arms the U.S. provided, until the eve of the president's coerced
departure 6. Why Washington placed every pressure at its disposal to
force the democratically elected President of Haiti to surrender his
constitutional powers <br>
7. Why President Aristide was kidnapped in fact, even as Toussaint
Louverture was kidnapped to imprisonment in France in 1803 and Philippine
President Emilio Aguinaldo was kidnapped by U.S. soldiers to end the
Philippine-American War in 1901?<br><br>
The Western Hemisphere cannot be a safe or happy place until U.S.
military and economic intervention and regime change end, justice for all
is assured, reparations for past offenses to Haiti are paid and until
President Aristide returns for Haiti to serve his people.<br><br>
Ramsey Clark<br>
March 1, 2004<br><br>
----------------------------------------------<br>
New Book: Haiti A Slave Revolution is a powerful anthology. Fredrick
Douglas, Edwidge Danticat, Mumia Abu Jamal, Ramsey Clark, Ben Dupuy,
Maude LeBlanc, Paul Laraque and others document 200 years of U.S.
interventions, blockades, invasions and occupations against the first
successful slave revolution in history. 250 pages, photo section,
index.<br>
Order from
<a href="http://www.leftbooks.com/" eudora="autourl">www.leftbooks.com</a><br>
Read chapters from the book at:
<a href="http://www.iacenter.org/haiti/index.htm" eudora="autourl">www.iacenter.org/haiti/index.htm</a><br><br>
<br><br>
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