* * * HAITI INFO * * * News direct from the people and organizations of Haiti's democratic and popular movement 18 May 1996, Vol. 4, #14 *** HAITI INFO now has photos in every issue *** Contents: INSECURITY, TROOPS & PRIVATIZATION DOMINICAN ELECTIONS ARISTIDE BREAKS HIS SILENCE MEDIA & THE OCCUPATION: A SIGNIFICANT CASE >From Les Cayes: LAVALAS MUSICAL CHAIRS Popular Culture & Struggle: INYON JEN ANGAJE Common Ground: ISRAEL KILLS WITH U.S. BACKING Stories: INSECURITY, TROOPS & PRIVATIZATION PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 18 - Privatization and negotiations with the multilateral banks have been replaced by insecurity as the headline-grabber here. This week another member of the Haitian National Police (HNP) was shot and killed, again while off-duty, this time in Cite Soleil. One of his assailants was also shot and killed, but his body was mysteriously carried away. The beleaguered HNP this week announced rewards for information on the four recent murders of police. (Almost as if on cue, U.S. Undersecretary of Defense John White visited Haiti last week, offering 180 vehicles and other equipment to the HNP.) Other recent attacks include the sacking of a rural HNP station, and a prison guard shot five times. Finally, yesterday a long-time employee of Prime Minister Rosny Smarth was found murdered in Smarth's Cavaillon home. A shooting occurred last Saturday in front of the headquarters of the U.S.-founded secret police, Service d'Intelligence National (SIN). That is rumored to have been the last straw for President Rene Preval, who visited to announce it was "closed for restructuring." The government also recently fired 11 officers involved in a protest. [See last issue] Insecurity = Troops to Stay The government, the public and the HNP are all nervous about the origins of the newest wave of insecurity, especially since it is quite obviously political insecurity. But while Preval has yet to officially pronounce himself, U.N. officials, pointing to deteriorating conditions, have gone ahead and taken the liberty of calling for an extension of the U.N. mandate. On May 9, Inter Press Service reported, Special U.N. Envoy to Haiti Enrique Ter Horst announced that due to the HNP's weakness, there is still not "a sure and stable environment" and "our presence would still be required for some time." On May 10, Canadian Minister of Defense David Collenette was already here to discuss, among other things, the U.N. troop presence. And this week, the U.N. spokesman here said that the "Haitian government agrees" and that "preliminary discussions have begun." There are 1,900 soldiers and 280 police monitors here. There are also about 200 members of the U.S. Special Forces (although one of them called it "a support group") who are under direct U.S. command. They were in the news last week after constructing a school. Through an accord with the Haitian government (which has never been reported on), they will be here "for over another year." Negotiations Still in the Fore In the meantime, the month-long negotiations with the banks have continued. They were to have ended on May 15, but the announcement that International Monetary Fund Director Michel Camdessus will arrive on May 23 to sign accords appears to mean there is still some fine-tuning to be done. And while Minister of Finances Fred Joseph has repeatedly told radio journalists that negotiations were going "well," that "the banks did not put pressure on us," and has even said that Haiti will be allowed to (re-)raise some of its tariffs to protect local crops, there are many issues not settled. Parliament, which comically went on vacation last week without voting on the budget (the fiscal year ends in a few months), has suddenly been recalled for an "extraordinary session" on May 20 to consider a number of laws, many related to the negotiations: a law on "the modernization of state enterprises" (to authorize their sale and/or lease), one on the reduction of the amount of public sector employees and a third on tariffs. Discordant voices coming from parliament indicate it will not be smooth sailing there. That no doubt prompted the recent visit of U.S. Undersecretary of Treasury Lawrence Summers who discussed with Preval "the need to negotiate quickly," he said, and who overtly pressured lawmakers during an impromptu stop at parliament. DOMINICAN ELECTIONS PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 17 - Voters in the Dominican Republic went to the polls yesterday. The three candidates did not offer any real alternatives, and the campaign focused more on musical themes, the usual promises and mud-slinging, and also, not unexpectedly, attempts to play on racism and anti-Haitianism. With half the vote counted today, authorities said Jose Francisco Pea Gomez, of the Partido Revolutionario Dominicano (PRD), had 46% and announced run-off elections with the second runner-up, Leonel Fernandez of the Partido de la Liberacin Dominicana (PLD), who got 35 percent. The candidate of President Joaquin Balaguer's party, Jacinto Peynado of the Partido Reformista Social-Christiano (PRSC), came in third with 18%, a clear rejection of the Balaguer's regime. Race and anti-Haitianism were in the headlines during the last month of the campaign. First, Dominican soldiers forcibly expelled between 1,000 and 5,000 people supposedly for being illegal aliens. Some were Haitian workers, others Dominican citizens, others Haitians with correct papers. That move, as well as Balaguer's statements, like telling people to vote for "an authentic Dominican," and the PLD's claim that 170,000 Haitians were illegally registered to vote (when lists were checked, only a handful were found), were obvious attempts to influence voters against Pea Gomez, an orphan from the border region (and, his enemies say, of Haitian heritage) and the darkest of the candidates. The Haitian government reacted very meekly to the repatriations, in contrast to the strong condemnations from Dominican, Haitian and U.S. human rights groups. This week the president addressed the issue for the first time, but rather than criticizing Balaguer, President Rene Preval instead announced he and all his ministers were going to donate half their salaries to help repatriated people and asked all state employees to do the same, saying: "Open your hearts and open your wallets!" [See Haiti Info v.4 #10] ARISTIDE BREAKS HIS SILENCE PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 10 - After months of silence, during which the Lavalas camp has strained to keep its internal disagreements under control, former President Jean Bertrand Aristide broke his silence yesterday in an interview with Agence Haitienne de Presse (AHP). But his comments did little more than illustrate once again the former head of state's penchant for cultivating ambiguity and fuel speculation on his future political aspirations. Aristide began saying he would not give his opinion on certain topics because "the Romans used to divide to conquer" and if "we" disagree rather than "dialoguing... we will be responsible for our own failure." But Aristide did not wait too long before calling privatization "a cigarette lit at both ends" that "never improved the lot of the citizens in any country," even though the current government is carrying out policies his government started. Aristide called for dialogue "in order to not enter into this dossier in a dispersed manner." He ambiguously countered speculation on divergences between him and sectors of the Lavalas camp by saying his relationship with the president is "normal," but then obliquely criticized him when he said the country's leaders should listen to "the people." "Unity at the heart of the population is indispensable. Unity between authorities and the people is just as indispensable," he said. Aristide also noted that his return on Oct. 15, 1994, reversed the political coup d'etat, but that the "economic coup d'etat" still needed to be beaten, but he did not specify what constituted the economic coup. Aristide cryptically warned people not to heed the "lies and systematic disinformation" promoting division, he said, and to distinguish between those who remained faithful "to the struggle," AHP said, and those who "have already sold their soul to satisfy a certain agenda or a certain sector financing division." He did not elaborate. Regarding the recent wave of insecurity and attacks on the new police, Aristide said "if, for a long time, they used the army to marginalize people, today they think it is necessary to have a militarized police to do the same job. And since they cannot yet do that, they kill police officers to create division between the police and the population." Although the ex-president did not designate the "they" of yore, today, as Aristide well knows, "they" are in charge of recruiting, training and equipping the new police, just as the authors of the "economic coup" are clear, at least to many popular organizations: they are the U.S. and the multilateral banks with their neoliberal dictates. All of Aristide's criticisms sound a little bizarre coming from the one responsible for putting these things into place. MEDIA & THE OCCUPATION: A SIGNIFICANT CASE On May 1, Inter Press Service (IPS) lost an editor. A wire service with reporters in over 100 countries, IPS, which focuses on what it calls the "Third World," is supported by sales to news outlets, foundation grants and, to a large extent, grants from U.N. agencies. For the previous year, Daniel Coughlin, who had been a reporter and editor with IPS for four years, headed an IPS project where he was attempting to "fully develop IPS coverage of the Caribbean and integrate Haiti into that coverage... and into the Americas as a whole" through translation, reporting and distribution. The project was never fully funded because, according to Coughlin, "there was no real interest on anybody's part... to actually see that whole project fully implemented." Coughlin said that, whereas journalists and editors were pushing the project, to the relevant IPS and U.N. bureaucrats, the main interest was "just to get money," and when it did not come through, interest died. But Coughlin also encountered political obstacles and decided not to stay on with IPS, for the reasons he outlines in this interview with Haiti Info: Q: What was your experience on an editorial level? I think it's really important to remember that in Haiti, it's a military commitment from the U.N. and the U.S. It's a military commitment above everything else, and therefore press and information has a military aim, a military purpose, and that means controlling and disseminating information that, at the very least, does not hinder the objectives of your military mission. And so you will find... a very high priority by the U.N. mission in Haiti and the U.S. multinational force to controlling what kind of information comes out within Haiti itself, and also through the international wire services... IPS became important in this regard because we distributed our information in Haiti, and when we wrote articles that were critical or appeared to be critical of the U.N. military mission and or the U.S. military mission, we became the subject of quite a lot of pressure Q: Can you give an example? The most famous example is something called the 'Schlisser memo' which was a memorandum written in September of 1995 by a U.S. military official in the U.N. mission outlining a number of different points, but including, and most alarmingly, advocating having no justice for the 5,000 murder victims of the coup d'etat because that was perceived by the bourgeoisie in Haiti as retribution, and secondly, the importance of pushing through a privatization program and overall structural adjustment program for Haiti because, again, that would keep a profit going to the Haitian bourgeoisie. When this article was published, it created a huge outcry. The U.N. was very, very upset about it, because obviously it revealed some facts about the U.N.'s role in Haiti that officials did not want to be publicly circulated... so, of course, U.N. officials reacted very forcibly to this article and they denounced the news agency. They denounced the journalist, myself, who wrote the article, they questioned our 'intentions' and raised doubt about the veracity of the reporting publicly and then, of course privately, protested vehemently to the head of the agency, and, in my opinion, tried to get me fired... The U.N. also cut off access to information to me. This is a rather typical reaction of authorities... They cut off access to information for me until such time as I wrote 'a public letter of apology' explaining that I did not mean to cause 'public alarm' about the U.N. role in Haiti. [He refused.] That's just a little break-down of how they try to really pressure journalists, how they try to control, particularly with a military mission where they are very concerned about public perception towards that military mission and to ensure that there is no public opposition... I simply reported on a document. It wasn't even a leaked document; it was an internal U.N. document which I obtained and wrote about and seeing the emperor without his clothes on obviously caused some embarrassment... Q: What does this experience make you say about the possibilities of doing good, professional journalism and the so-called 'freedom of the press'? Here we have a perfect example, I think... [of how] it's made clear to you as a journalist that if you write about something that the U.N. finds objectionable, they will make your life miserable, and so a lot of journalists, of course, don't write anything critical of the U.N.... Time and time again, there were many, many stories about U.N. abuses of power, U.N. political activities which would be highly embarrassing... that just don't get reported. We could talk about the situation of the U.N. soldiers in Gonaives who reportedly shot and killed two Haitian demonstrators in November, 1995. That story was completely covered up. There are dozens of other stories, perhaps equally alarming, that were completely covered up, and also that journalists didn't want to cover because they were afraid of the repercussions... Q: What can you say about coverage? [Regarding the non-Haitian journalists], unequivocally, there's just no real reportage happening. It's simply a regurgitation of official policy... Certainly, the non-Haitian journalists rarely deviated from the line put out by the U.S. embassy and generally would report that all the time, all the time. >From Les Cayes: LAVALAS MUSICAL CHAIRS LES CAYES, Apr. 29 - A recent musical-chairs of Lavalas officials here offers a good illustration of the kinds of "reforms" being carried out by the Ministry of Justice and its U.S. tutors, and also the kind of fighting over the "goodies" that has been seen more than once among Lavalas members. In mid-April, Minister of Justice Max Antoine replaced Judge Dominique Esperant with Jean Dequel Merger in the Les Cayes tribunal after the local bar association held a week-long strike against Esperant, supposedly for poor practices. The nomination made worse an already simmering conflict between the South chapter of Oganizasyon Politik Lavalas (OPL) and Federasyon Oganizasyon Sid (FOS), linked also to the local Lavalas movement but whose members also include former members of the CIA- linked death squad FRAPH (Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien). Merger is a founding member of FOS and Esperant is a member of OPL. Last year the two groups held demonstrations and counter- demonstrations over the Delegate (a local representative of the executive) and the Ministry of Health representative. FOS and other groups were protesting the officials, and OPL was supporting them. At the time a member of a local popular organization said: "Ever since President Jean-Bertrand Aristide appeared with the criteria of 'militancy' in order to work in the public administration, opportunistic job-seekers have not ceased using popular organizations as a way of getting ahead." (FOS resorted to demonstrations again this time, rounding up 50 people on Apr. 22 to try to prevent Merger from being sworn in. They threatened to block the highway leading to Port-au-Prince until police broke them up. Since then, Merger took office.) Both men are linked to the Lavalas apparatus: Esperant was named Justice of the Peace during the first Aristide term (in 1991) but remained in his post after the coup d'etat in September. In October, 1991, he even collaborated with local army officers in at least one search of homes of members of popular organizations. In spring of 1992 (after the army had arrested and beaten to death Jean-Claude Museau as well as carried out other repressive acts), he was fired. Merger was also appointed by the Aristide government and served as Delegate. He also cooperated with the illegal regime until he was fired in the spring of 1992. Minister Antoine, a native of nearby Cavaillon, is not unfamiliar with the terrain, either. Before he took office this winter, he was serving as a lawyer for the Museau family in their attempt to get justice. While a hasty in absentia trial of a henchman took place (without Antoine even being informed), nobody has ever been brought forward to be tried, and despite Antoine's new position, there have been no apparent steps in that direction. [See Haiti Info v.3 #20] The question that the population is asking themselves now is: "Will these kind of Lavalas reforms bring us justice?" In any case, the revocations, nominations and demonstrations "do not make people hot nor cold." Popular Culture & Struggle: INYON JEN ANGAJE The fall of Jean-Claude Duvalier and the blossoming of the democratic and popular movement brought about also a flowering of what is called "musique engagee": music committed to the struggle of the Haitian people for change. In the weeks to come, POPULAR CULTURE & STRUGGLE will present some of the musicians and musical groups born out of that period and which are still carrying forth their message and struggle today. We are a sovereign people. That's what we truly are. We're going to walk hand-in-hand and tell the world, Aye! We are independent! We are a people married to liberty, We are a people that knows what it wants, We are a people who knows where it came from, We are a people who knows where it is going! That is an extract from just one of the many poems and songs written and performed by Inyon Jen Angaje (IJA) (Union of Youths Committed to the Struggle), a mass organization born on Jan. 24, 1987. Although today not related to the ti legliz movement, it originated out of the community that had gathered around the church of former Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide (later burned to the ground in 1988 in an attack where at least 13 died and 77 were injured). Other groups from the same community include Solidarite Ant Jen, Veye Yo and some ti kominote legliz (TKL) groups. "We saw that we needed another organ... so that we could reach the ears of the people," said one of the founding members after a recent rehearsal. "IJA is the result of observations that we made, where we realized that a tool was missing, a tool we could use to fight against the culture that the imperialists were sending." "They thought they could burn the dream of the youth when they burned St. Jean Bosco, but they were wrong," continued the young man, today in his twenties but who was 18 when he and others founded IJA. When it started, IJA had a theater and poetry section and a folkloric dance section. In 1990, it began a choral section. Between eight and twenty young men and women participate in the performances, sometimes accompanied by musicians playing three different sized drums and by "bambu," indigenous wind instruments usually made from bamboo. They write almost all of their songs and poems, and choose themes and subjects from the country's reality. "Yankee Hypocrisy" was written during the coup d'etat: When things go bad in other countries, not under its control, The Yankees hide behind the U.N. and O.A.S.... It's the State Department, inside the O.A.S. and U.N. that did the coup d'etat, We have to get Haiti out from under those ugly institutions that are caressing us to make us go to sleep... Problems in other big countries, the U.N. is in the Yankees' claws. The game is rotting in Haiti, but the Yankees do not do anything: hypocrisy! Nothing can be fixed, or the Yankees' interests will be in danger. "We want to transform the experience of everyday to help people understand their reality," said one of the founders. "We also want to do a cultural revolution and fight against acculturation. That is our priority... to fight against the invasion of Western culture." "In our songs we try to expose the truth," said another. Through its verses and chorus, Lamerik Latin gives the true history of the "discovery" and colonial period. Latin America is still sad... They finished pillaging and raping a race, supposedly to make it 'civilized,' to evangelize it, but that won't fool us... During the coup d'etat, IJA, whose members today are students, professionals, artists and also unemployed, continued rehearsing and performing. Sometimes they would meet at a school and have French grammar books on their desks, so they could pretend to be in a class. Some performances were open, and others were "practically in secret." Some members had to go into hiding. Despite the hardships, the fact that they sometimes lose people who get involved in other activities, and the odds they are up against, IJA has now been on the terrain for nine years, and will keep working "until we accomplish our task." It hopes to step up activities with a series of performances together with other groups this summer. Common Ground: ISRAEL KILLS WITH U.S. BACKING Once again, because it does not suit its purposes, the U.S. is disregarding the United Nations, this time to support its client- state and consort, Israel. But with the end of the Cold War, its policy of blind and systematic support of Israel's aggressive actions is getting harder and harder to justify. Even if the U.S. continues to wield its veto-power in the Security Council (SC) (and, of course, throw around its military and economic weight in various venues where it is hegemonic, or nearly so), with such obvious favoritism, it is putting itself in a difficult position in regards to the role it wants to play in the region. [See also Haiti Info v.4 #1] "Operation Grapes of Wrath" The days leading up to, surrounding and following the Israel Defense Force's Apr. 18 attack on the U.N. camp at Qana, Lebanon, where over 100 refugees, mostly women and children, were ripped to pieces by 13 shells, reveal how far Israel will go to achieve its foreign policy ends as well as clinch votes in domestic elections. And then lie about it. After the Hamas suicide attacks prompted massive Western political and military support for Israel, accompanied by a showy conference in Egypt on "terrorism," Israel launched a vast military operation, leaving little doubt over the identity of the real terrorists in the region. Even though Shimon Peres tried to justify "Operation Grapes of Wrath" by citing the increase in attacks from Hizbollah rockets, the truth is that the Nobel Peace Prize-winner is facing tough elections and needed an occasion to show he could talk peace and stand tough at the same time. His massive show of "state terrorism" rained thousands of shells (some estimate 24,000) on towns, highways, ports, hospitals and other civilian infrastructure. It was immediately denounced by Lebanon and other nations, but as is typical in the case of Israel, the U.S.-dominated SC was dragging its feet. It was only the arrogant and ruthless attack on a long-standing (18 years) U.N. encampment at Qana, 12 kms. from the Israeli-Lebanese border, that moved the body to action. The carnage at Qana, the overwhelming firepower used, Israel's former record of precision attacks and a videotape confirming it knew what it was doing that day loaded one too many straws on the camel's back. On May 7, U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros- Ghali, who is far from hostile to the U.S.'s bellicose and aggressive foreign policy in the Middle East, went further than he usually has (and confirmed what most already assumed) when he embraced a report saying Israel deliberately targeted the U.N. base. Immediately, and predictably, the U.S. reacted: State Department spokesman Nicolas Burns attacked the "infatuation, in places like New York, of looking into all the corners of the past, when the Israeli government has already stood up and taken its responsibility." Irresponsibility for 18 Years But Burns, like most U.S. diplomats over the past 40 years, is covering for Israel, and for U.S. interests, once again. In addition to lying blatantly regarding the Apr. 18 attack (like denying it had reconnaissance planes, and then after hearing about the video which shows two helicopters and an unmanned "drone" videotaping, admitting there was a plane, but that it was on another mission), Israel's very presence in Lebanon is an example of its failure to "take its responsibility" and of its blatant disregard for the U.N. and for international law. According to U.N. SC resolution 425 (1978), Israel should have withdrawn from Lebanon 18 years ago. It had invaded with "Operation Latini," part of its war against Palestinians. The SC called on Israel to pull out and sent some 4,500 troops (UNIFIL: U.N. Interim Forces in Lebanon) to supervise. Instead, Israel withdrew only part-way, and then set up its own militia, the "South Lebanese Army" (SLA), in a 15-km. wide "Security Zone" and until today, UNIFIL has done nothing to block the occupation and Israeli invasions. (Israel re-invaded in 1982 and pulled out partially in 1985.) UNIFIL is instead a sort of armed "humanitarian force," offering shelter to refugees of Israeli attacks and undertaking projects like building schools. As the occupation continued, resistance grew, and Hizbollah and other forces continued to resist the Israelis and SLA. "What we have in Southern Lebanon is a foreign occupation," the Lebanese representative to the U.N. told the SC on Apr. 15, three days before the Qana attack. "The Lebanese are within their legitimate right to defend themselves against occupation, human rights abuses and displacement." Israel's defiance of the U.N. is nothing new, and also would not be possible without the undying political, military and economic support of the U.S. The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs counted 66 SC resolutions against Israel between 1953 and 1992. Israel has not complied with any requiring compliance. In addition, between 1972 and 1990, the U.S. vetoed an additional 29 resolutions to shield its protectorate. While the SC is happy to slap sanctions on other non-compliant nations, it has never taken steps to punish Israel, and at hearings last month, many representatives told the SC that it is this impunity which is responsible for Israel's continued aggressions in the region. U.N. Foot-Dragging When the attack at Qana took place, "Grapes of Wrath" was already on the table. A letter from the Lebanese delegation to the SC dated Apr. 13 complained of "the grave situation in Lebanon resulting from large-scale Israeli bombing" and on Apr. 15, representative Samir Moubarak called for the council to take "swift action to stop this Israeli madness" and described the outcome of the "joint venture of terrorism and Israeli elections": Apr. 12 - six civilians dead, 22 injured, 50,000 displaced; Apr. 13 - 40 shells per minute raining down on villages in Bekaa, 12 dead, 30 injured, 150,000 more displaced; Apr. 15 - shelling all over Lebanon, with 100 shells per minute dropping on places like the archeological site of Tyre. He said there would be no peace until Israel withdrew from Lebanese territory. The SC took no action nor did the General Assembly (GA), until the Qana attack. Then, on Apr. 18, the SC issued a tepid resolution calling for a cessation of hostilities and declaring support for peace talks. It rejected a more strongly worded resolution which called for withdrawal of Israel from Lebanon, and condemned Israeli aggression. The GA issued a more strongly worded statement on Apr. 23 which condemned Israel's attacks on Lebanese civilians and called for the withdrawal of Israel in accordance with SC resolution 425 (1978). General Disapproval Submitted to the SC on May 7, there is little expectation the matter will go much further, since the U.S. always stands ready to veto. Boutros-Ghali's decision to issue the report without changing it, despite Israeli protests, was a positive sign, especially coming just when he needs U.S. support to be re- elected. Perhaps he reached a limit in how much Israeli and U.S. impunity and intransigence he can tolerate? Certainly others have. The Jewish Committee on the Middle East (an association of Jewish university professors at over 175 U.S. universities) last week angrily called for U.N. "sanctions" and listed 13 other "instances of unconscionable Israeli actions" like the Dome of the Rock massacre (1990) and the Deir Yassein massacre (1948) and also said: "The entire world is well aware that when it comes to Israel, the U.S. applies a grossly hypocritical double- standard that seems to have no limits." Diplomats are also breaking their silence. Regarding the "peace process," Egyptian Foreign Minister Amir Moussa pointed out: "The American role is very important but certainly there is an imbalance now in dealing with the Arab-Israeli equation." But diplomats have criticized the SC's double-standards before and then returned to the status quo. Boutros-Ghali himself even said, in 1993, that there was "a growing perception throughout the international community that the Council, by not pressing for Israeli compliance, does not attach equal importance to the implementation of all of its decisions." It is not just a "perception." It is fact, and three years later, the double-standard remains, and the U.S., and its favorite flagrantly use and abuse the U.N., heeding its resolutions only when convenient. When we add to that the fact that Israel is constantly violating regional peace accords, like with the recent shut-down of Gaza, what can really be expected from the peace process? SOURCES: The Independent, The Nation, Third World Resurgence, Inter Press Service, the United Nations Information Centre. 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 range from U.S. $20 to $100, depending on location and method of reception. For subscriptions, other correspondence and help for journalists: Haitian Information Bureau, c/o Lynx Air, Box 407139, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, 33340, USA. For electronic mail: hib@igc.apc.org.