<html>
<body>
<h1><font size=4><b>Wikileaks Haiti: The Aristide
Files</b></font></h1><font size=3>Kim Ives and Ansel Herz | August 5,
2011 - Nation Magazine<br><br>
US officials led a far-reaching international campaign aimed at keeping
former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide exiled in South Africa,
rendering him a virtual prisoner there for the last seven years,
according to secret US State Department cables.<br><br>
The cables show that high-level US and UN officials even discussed a
politically motivated prosecution of Aristide to prevent him from
“gaining more traction with the Haitian population and returning to
Haiti.”<br><br>
The secret cables, made available to the Haitian weekly newspaper
<i>Haïti Liberté </i>by WikiLeaks, show how the political defeat of
Aristide and his Lavalas movement has been the central pillar of US
policy toward the Caribbean nation over the last two US administrations,
even thoughor perhaps becauseUS officials understood that he was the
most popular political figure in Haiti.<br><br>
They also reveal how US officials and their diplomatic counterparts from
France, Canada, the UN and the Vatican tried to vilify and ostracize the
Haitian political leader.<br><br>
For the Vatican, Aristide was an “active proponent of voodoo.” For
Washington, he was “dangerous to Haiti’s democratic consolidation,”
according to the secret US cables.<br><br>
Aristide was overthrown in a bloody February 2004 coup supported by
Washington and fomented by right-wing paramilitary forces and the Haitian
elite. In the aftermath of the coup, more than 3,000 people were killed
and thousands of supporters of Aristide and his Fanmi Lavalas political
party were jailed.<br><br>
The United States maintained publicly that Aristide resigned in the face
of a ragtag force of former Haitian army soldiers rampaging in Haiti’s
north. But Aristide called his escort by a US Navy SEAL team on his
flight into exile “a modern-day kidnapping.”<br><br>
Two months later, the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) was
established, a 9,000-strong UN occupation force that still oversees Latin
America’s first independent nation.<br><br>
Aristide has spoken forcefully against the UN occupation, particularly in
his 2010 year-end letter to the Haitian people. “We cannot forget the $5
billion which has already been spent for MINUSTAH over these past six
years,” he wrote. “Anybody can see how many houses, hospitals, and
schools that wasted money could have built for the victims” of the
January 12, 2010, earthquake that destroyed much of Port-au-Prince and
surrounding regions.<br><br>
Such positions are major reasons Washington fought to get and keep
Aristide out of Haiti, the cables make clear. “A premature departure of
MINUSTAH would leave the [Haitian] government...vulnerable to...resurgent
populist and anti-market economy political forcesreversing gains of the
last two years,” wrote US Ambassador Janet Sanderson in an October 1,
2008, cable. MINUSTAH “is an indispensable tool in realizing core USG [US
government] policy interests in Haiti.”<br><br>
At a high-level meeting five years ago, top US and UN officials discussed
how the “Aristide Movement Must Be Stopped,” according to an August 2,
2006, cable. It described how former Guatemalan diplomat Edmond Mulet,
then chief of MINUSTAH, “urged US legal action against Aristide to
prevent the former president from gaining more traction with the Haitian
population and returning to Haiti.”<br><br>
At Mulet’s request, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan urged South Africa’s
President Thabo Mbeki “to ensure that Aristide remained in South
Africa.”<br><br>
President Obama and Kofi Annan’s successor, Ban Ki-moon, also intervened
to urge Pretoria to keep Aristide in South Africa. The secret cables
report that Aristide’s return to Haiti would be a “disaster,” according
to the Vatican, and “catastrophic,” according to the French.<br><br>
But the regional and Haitian view was quite different. US Ambassador
James Foley admitted in a confidential March 22, 2005, cable that an
August 2004 poll “showed that Aristide was still the only figure in Haiti
with a favorability rating above 50%.”<br><br>
The Bahamian Foreign Minister Fred Mitchell, apparently referring to
Haiti’s revolutionary leader Toussaint Louverture’s kidnapping and
imprisonment in the Jura mountains in 1802, warned “that a perceived
‘Banishing Policy’ has racial and historical overtones in the Caribbean
that reminds inhabitants of the region of slavery and past
abuse.”<br><br>
<b>Keeping the Pressure On<br><br>
</b>After Aristide left Jamaica for exile in South Africa on May 30,
2004, the US government worked overtime to keep him out of Haiti and even
the hemisphere, even though the Haitian constitution and international
law stipulate that every Haitian citizen has the right to be in his
homeland.<br><br>
When Dominican President Leonel Fernández suggested at a hemispheric
conference eight months after the coup that Aristide should return and
play a role in Haiti’s political future, the United States reacted
angrily, saying in a cable that Fernández had been “wrong in advocating
the inclusion in the process of former president Jean Bertrand
Aristide.”<br><br>
The US Ambassador to the Dominican Republic “admonished” Fernández
“during a pull-aside at a social event.”<br><br>
“Aristide had led a violent gang involved in narcotics trafficking and
had squandered any credibility he formerly may have had,” US Ambassador
Hertell told him, according to a November 16, 2004, cable.<br><br>
“Nobody has given me any information about that,” Fernández
replied.<br><br>
The embassy followed up with a series of aggressive meetings insisting
that the Dominican government renounce its support for Aristide. The
meetings included a sit-down with the Dominican president specifically on
the subject of Haiti with the British, Canadian, French, Spanish and US
ambassadors.<br><br>
No charges were ever filed against Aristide for drug trafficking,
although the United States “spent, literally, tens of millions of
taxpayer dollars…trying to pin something, anything on President
Aristide,” Ira Kurzban, Aristide’s lawyer, told Pacifica Radio’s
<i>Flashpoints</i> in July. “They’ve had an ATF investigation, a tax
investigation, a drug investigation, and now apparently some kind of
corruption investigation.... The reality is they’ve come up with nothing
because there is nothing.”<br><br>
According to a report in <i>Haïti Liberté</i>, other sources say that a
US legal team is still angling to prosecute Aristide.<br><br>
In 2005, the Fanmi Lavalas political party planned large demonstrations
to mark Aristide’s July 15 birthday and call for his return. The US
Ambassador to France, Craig Stapleton, met with the French diplomatic
official Gilles Bienvenu in Paris to discuss the issue.<br><br>
“Bienvenu stated that the GOF [Government of France] shared our analysis
of the implications of an Aristide return to Haiti, terming the likely
repercussions ‘catastrophic,’ ” Stapleton wrote in a July 1, 2005, cable.
“Initially expressing caution when asked about France demarching the SARG
[conveying the message to the South African government], Bienvenu noted
that Aristide was not a prisoner in South Africa and that such an action
could ‘create difficulties.’ ”<br><br>
Stapleton swiftly overcame Bienvenu’s reluctance. Bienvenu agreed to
relay US and French “shared concerns” to the South African government,
saying that “as a country desiring to secure a seat on the UN Security
Council, South Africa could not afford to be involved in any way with the
destabilization of another country.”<br><br>
The Ambassador went even further: “Bienvenu speculated on exactly how
Aristide might return, seeing a possible opportunity to hinder him in the
logistics of reaching Haiti,” Stapleton wrote. “If Aristide traveled
commercially, Bienvenu reasoned, he would likely need to transit certain
countries in order to reach Haiti. Bienvenu suggested a demarche to
Caricom [Caribbean Community] countries by the US and EU to warn them
against facilitating any travel or other plans Aristide might have. He
specifically recommended speaking to the Dominican Republic, which could
be directly implicated in a return attempt.”<br><br>
Five days later in Ottawa, two Canadian diplomatic officials met with the
US Embassy personnel. “‘We are on the same sheet’ with regards to
Aristide,” one Canadian affirmed, according to a July 6, 2005, cable.
“Even before these recent rumors, she said, Canada had a clear position
in opposition to the return of Aristide.”<br><br>
Canada shared the message with “all parties...especially the Caricom
countries,” as well with South Africa.<br><br>
<b>Vatican Blocks Post-Quake Return of Aristide<br><br>
</b>The earthquake that killed tens of thousands and destroyed many parts
of the city also threatened to upend the established political order,
worrying diplomats.<br><br>
US Embassy’s Deputy Chief of Mission (DCM) met with a Vatican official in
the days after the earthquake to discuss Church losses and
responses.<br><br>
A January 20, 2010, cable reports, “In discussions with DCM over the past
few days, senior Vatican officials said they were dismayed about media
reports that deposed Haitian leaderand former priestJean Bertrand
Aristide wished to return to Haiti.... The Vatican's Assesor (deputy
chief of staff equivalent), Msgr. Peter Wells, said Aristide's presence
would distract from the relief efforts and could become
destabilizing.”<br><br>
Then the Vatican’s Undersecretary for Relations with States, Msgr. Ettore
Balestrero, conferred with Archbishop Bernardito Auza in Haiti, who
“agreed emphatically that Aristide's return would be a disaster.”
Balestrero “then conveyed Auza's views to Archbishop Greene in South
Africa, and asked him also to look for ways to get this message
convincingly to Aristide. DCM suggested that Greene also convey this
message to the SAG [South African government].”<br><br>
The Vatican’s position on Aristide’s return was augured in earlier
cables. In November 2003, three months before the bloody February 2004
coup against Aristide, a US political officer met with the Vatican’s MFA
Caribbean Affairs Office Director Giorgio Lingua. He said that “effecting
change in Haiti should be easier than in Cuba,” reported US Chargé
d'Affaires Brent Hardt in a November 14, 2003, cable. “Unlike Castro,
Lingua observed, Aristide is not ideologically motivated. ‘This is one
personnot a system,’ he added.”<br><br>
Shortly after the coup, on March 5, 2004, US Ambassador to the Vatican
James Nicholson wrote a cable reporting that the Holy See’s Deputy
Foreign Minister had “no regret at Aristide's departure, noting that the
former priest had been an active proponent of voodoo.”<br><br>
<b>A Hero’s Welcome<br><br>
</b>Aristide ultimately returned to Haiti on March 18, 2011, despite
personal calls by President Obama and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to
South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma to stop him. They argued he would
disrupt Haiti’s imminent elections.<br><br>
“The problem is exclusion, and the solution is inclusion,” Aristide said
during a brief return speech at the airport after landing. Then he made
his only reference, however oblique, to that week’s elections from which
his party was barred: “The exclusion of Fanmi Lavalas is the exclusion of
the majority.”<br><br>
Two days later, the second round of Haiti’s elections went off relatively
smoothly, but with historically low voter participation. Some polling
stations in Port-au-Prince were empty, with stacks of ballot sheets piled
high, hours before they closed. Less than 24 percent of registered
voters went to their polls, according to official statistics. Other
observers say the turnout was much less.<br><br>
On the morning of Aristide’s return in Port-au-Prince, thousands massed
outside the airport in an exuberant, spontaneous demonstration. They
jogged alongside his motorcade waving Haitian flags and placards bearing
Aristide’s visage, then scaled the fence surrounding Aristide’s home and
poured into its yard until there was no room left to move. The crowd even
climbed the walls and covered the roof.<br><br>
Sitting in an SUV just twenty feet from the door to his hastily repaired
but mostly empty house, Aristide and his family waited until a crew of
Haitian policeman managed to clear what resembled a pathway through the
crowd. First his wife and two daughters emerged from the car and dashed
inside the home.<br><br>
Finally Aristide, diminutive in a sharp blue suit, stood up in the car
doorway and waved. The crowd roared in excitement and surged around him.
The path to the door vanished. His security grabbed him and shouldered
their way through the sea of humanity until they got him to the house’s
door, through which he popped like a cork, clutching his glasses in his
hands.<br><br>
After a coup, kidnapping, exile, diplomatic intrigue and his rapturous
welcome, Aristide was finally home.<br>
<hr>
<div align="center"></div>
<b>Source URL:</b>
<a href="http://www.thenation.com/article/162598/wikileaks-haiti-aristide-files">
http://www.thenation.com/article/162598/wikileaks-haiti-aristide-files</a>
<br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#0000FF">
<a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">
www.Freedomarchives.org</a></font><font size=3> </font></body>
</html>