Violence in Haiti: KBOO Portland Radio

“Over the past week a new wave of violence has erupted in the
hurricane-ravished Haiti. The Associated Press has reported the beheadings
of several police officers in Haiti. The beheadings reportedly are the
work of supporters of ousted president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, in what
they’ve dubbed “Operation Baghdad.” But human rights groups in Haiti say
there’s little evidence that the beheadings were the work of Aristide
supporters. They blame the violence on government forces. KBOO’s Jacob
Fenston reports.”

Intro: “There’s been a lot of violence in Haiti the last few days…”

Fenston: That’s Brian Concannon, director of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in
Haiti (http://www.ijdh.org).

Concannon: For instance, there was a peaceful March on Thursday
[Sept. 30th] to commemorate the anniversary of Haiti’s last coup d’etat,
and unarmed demonstrators were fired upon by the police. Over the weekend
police started going into poor neighbourhoods and arresting, attacking,
and is some cases killing people who might be associated with President
Aristide or his Lavalas party. On Saturday, four former legislators,
[rather] two were former Senators and two were current members of the
house of deputies, were arrested inside of a radio station because they
had made comments critical of the [interim] government’s human rights
policy. Yesterday, 75 people were arrested in what was called an ‘arms
sweep’; the police said they were going in to get arms and they arrested
75 people without a warrant but they did not find a single gun in that
sweep.

Fenston: The current government was installed in February after the
U.S. [and U.N.] refused any protection to the democratically-elected
government of President Jean Bertrand Aristide. The day after Aristide’s
departure on a U.S. military aircraft, U.S. Marines landed to stabilize
the situation. But the rebellion destroyed much of the country’s fragile
infrastructure and left vast swaths in the power of paramilitaries, the
same paramilitaries who helped bring the current government to power. It
is estimated that the government controls only 20 to 40 per cent of the
country.

Bill Fletcher: The government has not been able to stabilize the
situation, and therefore was in no position to prepare for the hurricanes.

Fenston: That’s Bill Fletcher, Jr., President of the TransAfrica Forum (http://www.transafricaforum.org).
He blames the current violence on the interim government’s persecution of Aristide
supporters.

Fletcher: The interim puppet government has been undertaking to
repress opposition, and specifically, to eliminate supporters of President
Aristide. In the period since the February coup, there have been reported
approximately 3,000 political killings.

Fenston: The Associated Press reported the beheadings of three
police officers last week, but human rights groups are sceptical, saying
[that] the government is using these reports to justify further
repression.

Concannon: I’ve seen no proof that these beheadings have in fact
taken place, but they are being used to justify repression that is very
definitely taking place.

Fenston: Concannon says that though some photos have been
circulated, none of the bodies shown have been in uniform and the police
have not provided any details such as the names and ranks of the officers
killed

Concannon: If you go back and look, the beheading stories were
first circulated on Thursday, that was after the police fired on an
unarmed peaceful demonstration. In fact the UN head in Haiti, he admitted
that it was police firing on an unarmed demonstration, and in order to
justify that the police claimed that they were beheaded. But if you look
at radio reports earlier in the morning, the police had announced that
three policemen were beheaded in a shootout with a criminal gang that had
nothing to do with any of the demonstrations and happened in the early
hours of the morning. And so what they did was take these three people who
had been beheaded in a crime-fighting situation and then just transferred
that to the political situation. We had been sending investigators down to
the morgue to try and get details on who in fact was beheaded, and whether
it’s consistent with the police story; that continuously fails to check
out.

Fenston: The United Nations first asked for 7,000 troops for the
mission in Haiti, and while most experts agreed the number was too slim,
the UN has now promised only 5,700. Only 3,000 of those troops have
arrived in Haiti so far. Concannon says one problem with the UN mission is
that they don’t have the manpower to enforce their mandate.

Concannon: They have a mandate to keep the peace, they have a
mandate to protect the civilian population, and they have a mandate to
disarm these paramilitary groups, and they are not doing any of that
because they just don’t have the people.

Fenston: Concannon says UN forces have also collaborated with
Haitian forces in some illegal actions. During this weekend’s arrest of
four legislators, the UN blocked off the street and helped secure the area
around the radio station.

Concannon: The UN should have stepped in with its authority and
said ‘hey, we’re not going along with this; you can’t make this illegal
arrest,’ but they didn’t do that; they in fact backed up the police and
protected them by keeping demonstrators away from the radio station.

Fenston: I’m Jacob Fenston, KBOO News.

This report can be heard at href="http://www.kboo.fm/news-dept.php">KBOO Radio, Portland, Oregon.