[Bloquez l'empire!] Democracy Now: Another Massacre in Cite Soleil?

[aaron at resist.ca]

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/29/1446230

Another Massacre in Cite Soleil? Haitian Human Rights Activist Accuses UN
of Killing Dozens in Recent Attack on Port Au Prince Neighborhood

In Haiti, more than 1000 people marched through the streets of Port Au
Prince Thursday to protest the presence of UN forces in the country, and
to call for the return to power of the democratically elected former
President Jean Bertrand Aristide. Aristide lives in exile in South Africa
after his ouster in a US-backed coup nearly three years ago.

Thursday's march followed the deaths of as many as seventeen civilians who
were shot by UN troops in the capital city's impoverished Cite Soleil
neighborhood last week.

Demonstrators expressed outrage at what witnesses called indiscriminate
firing by UN forces. Many suggested that the UN's intention was to
suppress popular support of Aristide and his Lavalas political party.

The UN has denied charges that it fired indiscriminately, saying that it
was targeting armed gangs involved in recent kidnappings in the city.
Under control of the UN force, Cite Soleil has been plagued by kidnappings
and crime. Well, to discuss the situation, we are joined by Lovinsky
Pierre-Antoine and Kim Ives. Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine is a Haitian Human
Rights Activist and head of the September 30th Foundation - an advocacy
group for coup d'etat victims -- And Kim Ives is an independent journalist
who specializes in Haiti. we welcome you both to Democracy Now!

AMY GOODMAN: Well, to discuss the situation, we are joined by Lovinsky
Pierre-Antoine and Kim Ives. Lovinsky, is a Haitian human rights activist
and Head of the September 30th Foundation, an advocacy group for coup
d'etat victims. Kim Ives is an independent journalist who specializes in
Haiti and he’ll also be translating for Lovinsky. We thank you both for
joining us. Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine, what happened? Were you in Haiti at
the time or were you here when this happened last week?

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: Yes, I was in Haiti.

AMY GOODMAN: You were in Haiti. Tell us what happened.

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: Yes. I’m going to speak Creole


KIM IVES:Yes, go ahead.

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: [TRANSLATED]What happened in Haiti is a
continuation of a war of genocide against the poor population. And that is
an expression in fact of the class struggle in Haiti. What happens is that
the United Nations by what is called the MINUSTAH (United Nations
Stabilization Mission in Haiti) is an accomplice of this war against the
poor in Haiti. We can see what happened in Cité-Soleil on the 6th of July
of 2005--what happens every day in Cité-Soleil where soldiers kill the
poor for nothing, and what happened this past 21st, 22nd of December of
this year. This campaign against the poor in Haiti where they give them
some kind of pejorative name. The way that the United Nations soldiers
were trying to resolve the insecurity problem in the country, even if this
is a real problem, the way they resolve it is not appropriate.

JUAN GONZALEZ: I'd like to ask, in all my years as a journalist in terms
of seeing how the United Nations operates in peacekeeping missions, I've
never seen such periodic reports of the UN troops involved in aggressive,
violent actions against populations as there has been in Haiti over the
last few years. Do you--any sense of, on your part, why the UN is playing
such a role in Haiti, so different from what it's done around the world?

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: The problem is that the United Nations is
supposed to maintain peace, it’s supposed to be a force of stabilization.
In fact, the presence of the United Nations forces is just an expression
of the continuation of the 2004 coup d' etat. Because all the people who
were doing crimes at the end of 2003 and all the former military, they
don't have any problem. They are just circulating freely in the country.
But the people who are victims today of the United Nations forces, are
compatriots who are in Cité-Soleil and the other popular quarters who
stood up to Guy Philippe. The MINUSTAH cannot play the role of peacekeeper
because they’re not neutral.

AMY GOODMAN: MINUSTAH being the UN Forces?

KIM IVES: Yes, it’s the mission to stabilize Haiti.

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: And we feel in the situation there's too much
influence from the U.S. Embassy, and the Special Representative of the
United Nations Edmond Mullet. And to our mind the United Nations
represents an occupation force, which is pursuing repression against the
population and weakening institutions of state’s such as the police and
justice--and putting the country under tutelage.

AMY GOODMAN: The BBC just did an expose on the rape and abuse of kids in
Haiti by the UN Forces. Before that we did the Wayne State University
report on the massive number of rapes in Haiti and specifically looking at
UN forces. Now the UN forces say they went into Cité-Soleil in this last
shooting because of the gangs there and the kidnappings. Your response?

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: It is not that they were looking for gangs in
Cité-Soleil doing kidnappings. The phenomenon of security and kidnapping
in the country is purely a political phenomenon. One of the last acts of
kidnapping in the country was a guy—a Senator called Andris Riche, and
this was a complete piece of theater. And they did this precisely so that
they could target Cité-Soleil, to give the impression that they were
trying to fight against insecurity. But in other areas where there's
insecurities, such as in Carrefour-Feuilles where you have the Little
Machete Army, neither the National Police, or the minister soldiers did
anything to stop that.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Can't the, what power does the legal elected government of
Haiti have now to -- can't they just request that the UN troops leave? Why
haven't they?

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: Presently there’s a campaign that we've
undertaken, which will go between the first and15th of February to demand
that the Security Council remove the UN Troops from Haiti. And where the
Haitian government has not taken the responsibility to stop the genocide
there, we in the population, in the democratic sector, have taken on the
responsibility.

AMY GOODMAN: I'm looking at the press release from the United Nations, and
they say they are working with the security forces of Haiti, and in their
press release that was released last Friday after the killings in
Cité-Soleil, they say the operations have resulted in the arrests of 24
kidnap suspects and the liberation of six victims, a number of weapons
were also seized. Final comment?

LOVINSKY PIERRE-ANTOINE: Last killing that was done in Cité-Soleil, the
people who died were not people with guns in their hands. They were
pregnant women and children among them. According to journalists on the
ground, there were between 30 and 40 people who died. But we think it's
between 60 and 80 people because the people when they run, they take the
people who fell to run with them.

AMY GOODMAN: We want to thank you very much for being with us. Lovinsky
Pierre-Antoine, the Haitian human rights activist and Head of the
September 30th Foundation, who just came back from Haiti, and Kim Ives.
Thank you very much for joining us. That does it for today’s broadcast,
the last of the year. We want to thank all of you because you are at the
heart of this broadcast, the largest public media collaboration in this
country as it continues to grow in this country and around the world. I am
Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez. We wish you a very happy new year.