(Below is the table of contents and 2 stories from the most recent issue of Haiti Info, the newsletter of the Haitian Information Bureau. The lead story from each bi-weekly issue is posted in this conference. To receive the entire newsletter, you may subscribe by email, fax or mail. See the subscription information at the end of this entry). * * * HAITI INFO * * * News direct from the people and organizations of Haiti's grassroots democratic movement 8 October 1994, Vol. 3, #1 Contents: News Stories: OCCUPATION FORCES DEPLOYED - Haitian Military and Paramilitary Still Armed, Repression Continues ANTI-OCCUPATION MOVEMENT GROWS BEHIND SEPT. 30 - Lessons for the Movement [A News Analysis] CIA EXPOSED - Linked to FRAPH, Coup d'Etat THE HAITI "CRISIS" - Typical Information Manipulation STUDENTS EJECT DE FACTOS Human Rights: PARLIAMENT VOTES ON AMNESTY LAW GROUPS DEMAND TRUTH Common Ground: EL SALVADOR, PANAMA & HAITI - Three Cases of U.S. Intervention Sample stories: ANTI-OCCUPATION MOVEMENT GROWS PORT-AU-PRINCE, Oct. 5 - Although many in the population continue to consider the U.S. troops here as their "allies," many organizations in the democratic and popular movement are taking public positions against the intervention and occupation of Haiti. Demonstrations, denunciations and popular outrage have pushed the U.S. troops to disarm some soldiers and paramilitaries and seize some weapons which had been used in the brutal repressive structure built up over the past three years. However, this "alliance" between the popular demands for democracy and the U.S. military's real concerns here is temporary at best, and as soon as the population becomes more aware of the way innocent people continue to be beaten and even killed by repressive forces while U.S. troops stand by, how the U.S. funds and assists criminals like Emmanuel Constant, and the size of the contracts which will be offered to putschists for occupation projects, the people of Haiti will undoubtedly come to understand what many popular and peasant groups already see so clearly. Kombit Komilfo, a popular organization based in Grand-Goave, west of the capital, issued a two-page statement on Sept. 29 to remind people that the occupation forces are not going to implement the democratic changes demanded by the movement. "We all have to remember that the Haitian people, together with the popular organizations, are the principle victims of the Sept. 30 coup d'etat, because the coup is the endeavor of the pillaging class that opposes the Haitian masses' will to change, " the group said. "The Haitian people have to be really clear that if they want to terminate the coup and bury the Macoute system forever, they will have to count first on their own forces and their own arms... "This see-saw movement - with one day for the Macoutes, one day for the democrats which has become part of the politics of our country - has to end forever," they said. The Federation Nationale des Etudiants Haitiens (FENEH) said on Sept. 22 that it totally opposes the occupation. "This outrage to our pride as a people is nothing more than the logical follow-up to the coup... perpetrated against the legitimate aspirations of the Haitian popular masses and their arrival on the political scene," they said. "It is a new edition of 1915, which is the direct result of the complicity of American imperialism and its local lackeys for the protection of their petty interests." FENEH listed the objectives of the occupation as: the application of a neoliberal economic model; the dismantling of the "organizational structures of the masses" and the creation of a more effective "army of occupation" to keep the population at bay. Solidarite Ant Jen and Konbit Veye Yo, two popular organizations in the capital, on Sept. 23 said: "We don't understand, that after all those exhibitions in the demonstrations, radio spots and so on, those putschists accepted a foreign military invasion for the country. All of a sudden the word 'sovereignty' was deleted from their dictionary! "Concerning the hypocrisy of the international community, we cannot fathom that they can say one thing and then do the opposite," the groups continued. "If the situation has arrived at the point it is today, it is the result of the diplomacy of bowed heads of the Lavalas sector that seems to have forgotten that the people should be their own actors and the subjects of their own history." The groups also said: "It is with sadness that we note how the population has received, as a breather, the U.S. military intervention, although this reception is actually a result of the putschist repression. Nevertheless, it shows clearly the state of weakness of the popular movement." SAJ/Veye Yo called for people to mobilize so "the masses regain the democratic space (freedom of speech, of demonstration, of association, the autonomy of the university and so on) they won with their own forces in 1986. We have to give the masses accompaniment and guidance on the real road that will lead to a consequent democracy." Assemblee Populaire Nationale (APN), a mass organization, said that after the signing of the "accord," "we thought humiliation for human beings had limits, but the bourgeoisie and petite- bourgeoisie Lavalas people have demonstrated that, in front of the interest of the big guys, humiliation knows no limits and treason is something normal. We are stunned seeing how President Aristide is thanking Bill Clinton for having come to humiliate Charlemagne Peralte. "The Yankees occupied Haiti for 20 years, under the same pretext of reestablishing democracy in Haiti," APN continued. "Have we ever gotten that democracy? We think that the response is 'no.' Instead, after the many massacres committed during the occupation, this same criminal army was left behind to crush the people from 1934 until today. Do the U.S. imperialists have the interest in breaking down this army san maman ("without mothers")? We think the response is 'no.' Instead, they came to protect the Macoute army from the people who are demanding justice." Common Ground: EL SALVADOR, PANAMA & HAITI - Three Cases of U.S. Intervention The political stability of the Central American region is a constant and crucial element of U.S. foreign policy. In the seventies and eighties, the U.S. fought tirelessly to halt the spread of guerrilla movements in South and Central America. By the late eighties, that danger had been replaced by a relative calm, but that calm was disturbed by crises which demanded immediate U.S. attention. In the face of a potential for destabilization in El Salvador and Panama, and crippled by the regional "Contadora peace process," the U.S. had to find new methods in order to intervene and reestablish order so that it could maintain its hegemony and strengthen the domination of the internal economic and political forces it supports. The methods are all forms of intervention - military invasion, covert action, political intervention, economic warfare or a combination of several. Understanding those methods is crucial to comprehending the U.S. intervention here. In the two cases examined here, as well as in Haiti, the primary objectives were to bring nationalist movements and/or movements advocating revolutionary change under control. The U.S. attempts to reform the anachronistic system of exploitation rejected by the popular masses through brute force as well as the "professionalization" of the local armed forces, the "liberalization" of the economy and "democratic" elections. El Salvador: Background In 1981, the forces struggling for justice and social change in El Salvador opted for armed struggle against the corrupt government and military. The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other U.S. agencies had already been involved in El Salvador for decades, having established repressive death-squad "security" units in the sixties which were responsible for thousands of assassinations. With the switch from "low-intensity conflict" to open war, the U.S. stepped up its involvement, pumping in at least five billion dollars in the eighties and quadrupling the size of the Salvadoran army. (Without that support, the FMLN [Frente Farabundo Marti para la Liberacin Nacional] would have won the war.) The CIA also continued its work, remaining intimately linked with death-squad activities through its paid civilian and military "assets" and others. The U.S. armed forces also had up to 350 personnel - "Special Forces," trainers and so on - in the country at any one time. The war resulted in 75,000 deaths, the overwhelming majority of them civilian. The U.N.-sponsored "Truth Commission" later determined that the U.S.-trained, -funded and -advised armed forces were responsible for 85 percent of all human rights violations committed during the war; the paramilitary death squads, also organized and trained by the U.S., committed ten percent, and the FMLN, only five percent. "Peace Accords" Signed in 1992 The wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua were taking their toll not only on those countries but on others in the region. After five years of meetings and much to the consternation of the Reagan administration, in August 1987, the five Central American nations (the "Contadora group") signed an agreement pledging to restore peace to their countries through a series of reforms such as respect of human rights and more political liberties, and negotiations to end the armed struggles being carried out by irregular forces, including the U.S.-backed Contras. The countries agreed to promote a ceasefire and "reconciliation" so that the struggles could be transferred from the military to the political arena. The U.S. attempted to sabotage the process along the way, but once the agreement was reached, there was no choice but to go along. Changes in Eastern Europe, the "Contragate" scandal and other developments pushed Washington further in that direction, and it threw its weight behind the U.N.-brokered "peace process," exerting the same influence it exerts in other ostensibly U.N. affairs such as the Haiti crisis. In January, 1992, the FMLN and the Salvadoran government signed the Chapultepec Accord in Mexico City. It called for cutting the Salvadoran military from over 60,000 to about 30,000; the dissolution of the security forces and death squads; the dissolution of the intelligence network; the dissolution of the repressive National Police and the creation of a civilian- controlled National Civil Police (PNC), to be made up of 20 percent former FMLN fighters, 20 percent former government soldiers and 60 percent civilians; the distribution of land to almost 50,000 families - some ex-FMLN fighters, some soldiers and about 25,000 civilians; the establishment of a "Truth Commission" with a pledge from both sides to follow the recommendations of the commission, and national elections in 1994. "Peace" in El Salvador Today Almost three years later, life has changed in El Salvador, but not the way the FMLN and it supporters had hoped for or expected. The army has been cut down in size "for financial reasons" according to the government, but all of the other reforms to the armed forces have been stalled or corrupted. The "death squads" still exist and continue to operate with impunity. Between the accord-signing and the March 1994 elections, 40 FMLN leaders or candidates were brutally assassinated and many more were threatened. Although the new president, ultra-right-wing Armando Caldern Sol, has promised to dismantle the squads, many doubt his word. Numerous documents link him, senior officials in his government and other members of the ARENA party to the organization and funding of assassinations, disappearances and terrorist acts carried out during the eighties and the early nineties. (Some of those named are also linked to the CIA, whose recently released documents show it was, at the very least, aware of ARENA's death squad activities since 1985.) Although the FMLN has been certified as having turned in all of its weapons, the National Police, slated to be dissolved by now, is still in force throughout the country and has been linked by numerous investigators to many of the 500 violent crimes which occur in El Salvador every day. The intelligence network is also still intact. According to the U.N. as well as members of the force, the PNC, being trained under a U.S.-funded and -organized program, is already stacked with entire former units of the National Police, including those implicated in human rights abuses. They far outnumber the civilians or former FMLN fighters. The PNC itself has also already been accused of rights abuses. (The U.S. military presence in the country has never been greater. A U.S. institution - ICITAP, the Internatinal Criminal Investigations Training Assistance Program - is overseeing the training of the PNC. ICITAP, an offshoot of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation [FBI] was founded in 1986 in order to train police forces in Guatemala and El Salvador. Five hundred U.S. troops are also in the country and for the last year - including during the elections - carried out "Operation Strong Roads" with the local army, building schools and other civic projects to co-opt and intimidate the population.) The land distribution program is going very slowly. After almost three years, less than half the 50,000 families have their land. Conditions for the new farmers are not extraordinarily positive. They have to pay a mortgage over 30 years at a very favorable interest rate, but in order to finance seeds or other inputs, they will have to borrow at market rates (recently 18 percent) and pay back those loans within one year. In March 1993 the "Truth Commission" released an 800-page report detailing the crimes committed during the war. Although both sides had pledged to carry out the group's recommendations, which included a purge of the armed forces and the justice system, six days later the ARENA-dominated parliament approved a blanket amnesty. The elections carried out earlier this year were declared "fair" by international observers, but over 15 percent of the voters were unable to vote because of technicalities like a misspelled name (called "technical fraud") and another 45 percent chose not to vote. In the weeks leading up to voting day, the western part of the country - a traditional FMLN stronghold - was heavily patrolled by 3,000 army soldiers, reportedly on an anti-drug sweep. The death squads' obvious impunity and the fact that so many of the steps in the peace accord remained unfulfilled certainly led the population to doubt whether a vote for the FMLN would change anything. Despite its known link to the death squads, ARENA won the elections and once again controls the parliament and the presidency. Through ARENA and the new armed forces, the U.S. has regained total control of the country, has imposed a tough neoliberal agenda and has been able to reverse an armed revolutionary process and recuperate a great deal of the revolutionary forces into the system. The FMLN, which has essentially split and pulled back from its original demands, can now only hope to negotiate token changes for its supporters and perhaps to win more votes in the next elections. The future of the accords is also somewhat in doubt since Caldern has threatened in the past to ignore the accords because "he did not sign them." The U.N. force, scheduled to pull out of El Salvador last spring, is still there. Panama: Invasion and Aftermath The U.S. invasion of Panama was carried out under slightly different circumstances. Unlike the FMLN, but as is the case with Haiti's armed forces, the military government of Panama was actually an ally of the U.S. government. That relationship became modified when General Manuel Noreiga took his distance from the U.S. and decided to go with his own agenda - drug-trafficking, arms-trafficking and so on. Like Cedras in Haiti, he took a "nationalist" posture, supporting the Contadora peace process and building up his army for the eventual 1999 takeover of the Canal Zone under the terms of the 1977 Torrijos-Carter treaty. After imposing brutal economic sanctions and unleashing a huge propaganda campaign against the former CIA "asset" and informant, the Bush administration invaded Panama in December 1989, killing between 3,000 and 5,000 people and destroying tens of thousands of homes and other property. The U.S. immediately installed a hand- picked government, took over the four military bases it had given to Panama and carried out a massive "purification" campaign of arrests and/or dismissals against members of the armed forces, the civilian "Dignity Battalions," and others whose only "crime" was being anti-U.S. invasion. Over 15,000 public sector employees lost their jobs. The administration of the next four years, which was carefully handled and controlled by U.S. soldiers and State Department employees, oversaw more corruption and drug-running than ever witnessed under Noriega, and the "structural adjustment" program it carried out greatly increased the number of unemployed and poor. It also abrogated the progressive "Labor Code," one of the reforms carried out by Omar Torrijos Herrera before his suspicious death in 1981. Today, the U.S., through ICITAP, is training of a "new" police force, the Fuerza Pblica which it created to replace the dismantled Fuerzas de Defensa which it destroyed and dismantled. In Panama, the U.S. won in every aspect, and today the future of the Canal Zone is not certain. Although the new president, Ernesto Perez Balladares from the Partido Revolucionario Democrtico (PRD), the party founded by Torrijos, has taken anti-neoliberal and "nationalist" positions and promised to carry out the treaty, the U.S. has publicly doubted whether Panamanians can handle the administration of the canal, as well as whether they can afford to lose the 6,000 jobs and US$250 million of annual income. Lessons for Haiti What can be learned from these different "interventions" that might be relevant to Haiti? One is that the U.S. and its local and international allies are determined to impose a neoliberal economic agenda throughout Latin America in order to gain absolute control of the region. In the case of Haiti, the U.S. wants to insert the country into the world market through the U.S., as its appendage. This it will try to accomplish through an ultra- neoliberal model where the country will become completely dependent on the U.S. and the exterior, and will lose the little production capacity it possesses. More significantly, it is evident that the U.S. will not accept to have any of the region's armed forces out of its "sphere of influence" or, stated more blatantly, covert or overt control. It is willing to invade a country and destroy lives and property as in Panama, or risk political problems at home and deploy a "peaceful intervention" as in Haiti, all to insure complete control. In Haiti, as in El Salvador and Panama, the U.S. will be running the "reform" and "professionalization" of the police and army through ICITAP. If the record in other countries is an example, it is doubtful that the U.S. will insist on the "purging" of its loyal "assets" and informants. In neither El Salvador nor Haiti has it pushed for or helped carry out the disbanding or disarmament of the death squads. In all three countries, the U.S. has used the CIA to infiltrate the armed forces and in El Salvador as well as Haiti, it is linked directly to the death squads. The blanket amnesty granted by ARENA in El Salvador also has uncomfortable implications. The ARENA government which approved it is a U.S. ally, and U.S. officials only feebly condemned the measure, undoubtedly because trials and further investigation would have exposed the U.S. role in many of the human rights violations in El Salvador. (Investigations here into the actual coup d'etat, the organization and arming of the paramilitary structure and other activities would undoubtedly reveal that U.S. involvement went further than the U.S. ambassador's ominous warnings and Lynn Garrison's snooping around President Jean- Bertrand Aristide's bathroom.) Finally, the overt use of what media analysts call "demonstration elections" to declare a country "democratic" forebodes ill for Haiti. If death squad leaders like Caldern can fund and win a campaign, so can Emmanual Constant of FRAPH (Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien, the CIA-linked army's paramilitary front group), former Port-au-Prince mayor and Tonton Macoute leader Franck Romain and others. The combination of economic hardship, political repression and ideological indoctrination put the concept of "free and fair elections" in extreme doubt. The implications for Haiti from all of these experiences are extremely grim. As an occupying force of 20,000, and then as the most present and powerful of the "four friends" involved in the "U.N." force, the U.S. has a clear hegemony. The U.S. is also Haiti's largest bilateral donor and largest trading partner, and dominates almost all of Haiti's neighbors. Haiti's democratic and popular movement is facing the most difficult odds it has seen since 1986, but like the movements in El Salvador and Panama and other countries, it has no choice but to learn from those experiences and movements, and to persevere and continue in its quest for human rights, justice and liberation. SOURCES: Back issues of ALAI magazine, "NACLA Report on the Amereicas" and "Centroamerica, The Month in Review." Also Haiti Info v.1, #17 and v.2, #17 and "Naming-Names - Salvadoran Documents Link Top Leaders to Death Squads," Allan Nairn, Pacific News Service, 1994. ABOUT HAITI INFO: * Haiti Info is published every two weeks in Haiti by the Haitian Information Bureau, an alternative news agency, and is edited by a group of committed individuals from democratic and popular sectors. * All articles Copyright HIB. REPRINTS ENCOURAGED. Please cite Haiti Info and send copies of usage. * Haiti Info is available by mail, by fax, and also electronically via computer. Subscription rates: Individuals E-mail in the Americas - US$20 elsewhere - US$35 Organizations E-mail in the Americas - US$70 elsewhere - US$90 [Those fees negotiable for journalists and non-profits] Write for more information, help for journalists, subscription costs for mail and fax: Haitian Information Bureau, c/o Lynx Air, Box 407139, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, 33340, USA. For electronic mail: hib@igc.apc.org. ** End of text from cdp:reg.carib **