Godfather Colin Powell, The Gangster of Haiti: Kevin Pina's Notes on the "

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

"Killing Fields"


http://www.blackcommentator.com/80/80_cover_haiti.html

“I am the chief,” declares Guy Philippe, the 36-year-old, Green Beret-trained, three-time coup-meister and sometime police chief. “The country is in my hands.”

Not really. Haiti is in the same American and French hands that snatched President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to the Central African Republic – an involuntary destination on its face, where a French-approved military dictator sits in a palace that he seized from an elected President precisely one year ago. Pleased with the finesse of the "perfect coordination" between Paris and Washington, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin no doubt savors the grotesque, near-symmetric poetry of this joint venture in international piracy, in which Aristide is transported from the site of one coup to another.

“The niceties of democracy were thrown out the window, and the matters of principle so vigorously defended by President Chirac and Foreign Minister de Villepin over Iraq were quickly shunted aside,” said the Jamaica Observer in a March 1 editorial. “And new Canadians went with the flow.” The Caribbean Community must understand, “if they thought otherwise,” that “democratically-elected leaders are easily expendable if they, at a particular time, do not fit the profile in favor with those who are strong and powerful.”

Mini-megalomaniac Guy Philippe’s assignment is to liquidate Aristide’s grassroots supporters. In that sense, he is “the chief.” Even so, Philippe overreached on Tuesday when his troops were prevented by U.S. Marines from arresting Prime Minister Yvon Neptune. Earlier that day, Associate Editor Kevin Pina and Andrea Nicastro of the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, interviewed Neptune in his office. With Philippe’s troops massed nearby, Pina and Nicastro worked in haste to elicit the following responses from the Prime Minister:

1. "Even though I am the legal Prime Minister I am a prisoner in my office. That's a fact."

<snip>

Long piece comprised of both news and commentary. Worth the read.

[The Zanti Regent]

1. Everyone MUST read this excerpt!

Bush and his confederates lied in the faces of massed Black congressional representatives in the days leading up to Aristide’s departure (see “US House Members to Bush, Powell: Don’t Usurp Aristide’s Power,” February 26), with assurances from the President that, "We still hope to be able to achieve a political settlement between the current government and the rebels." We now know that the Bush men and France were even then seeking "perfect coordination" in removing Aristide. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice sat like bookmarks at Bush’s side as he lied to nineteen Black members of Congress.

Are these two conspirators fit to speak at any Black gathering, ever again in life? Who in the Black community will debase their organizations with the presence of such “role models?” An invitation to Powell or Rice should be viewed as proof of a moral deficit on the part of the inviter.

Belafonte was right...

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

2. Thanks... There's so much here that chosing 4 paragraphs

was impossible. I just started at the beginning.

[The Zanti Regent]

5. This sums it up...

Colin Powell is “the most powerful and damaging black to rise to influence in the world in my lifetime.” – TransAfrica founder Randall Robinson

[JohnOneillsMemory]

8. Colin probably thought he'd change from within. But he changed by being in

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

9. He's a disappointment... n/t

[mediaman007]

3. i am a hypocrite...

to some extent everyone is.

But it sure is unreal the way that this administration refuses to admit that they are hypocrites. Within one year we had to liberate Iraq from a dictator and liberate Haiti from a democracy.

[BlueEyedSon]

4. Thanks.

[BlueMole]

6. Great Read

The Chomsky piece is informative too. Thanks

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

7. NP, and welcome to DU, BlueMole!

:toast:

[Tinoire]

11. Welcome to DU !

:toast:

[dax]

10. Check this out-before the coup Haiti police were working with the "rebels

I have been posting about this and not been able to prove that there are thugs running around saying they are "Aristide supporters" doing violence to provide fodder for the propaganda-check this out:

http://www.haiti-progres.com/eng02-11.html
This was dated February 11 about when the US Armed Surrogate army invaded Haiti and began taking territory and performing targetted assasinations.(on February 5)

"The next day, armed men from the opposition-aligned organization RAMICOS attacked the police station 25 miles south of Gonaïves in the town of St. Marc, which also straddles the strategic main artery to Haiti’s north. They also looted and burned the customs house and some containers. The police rapidly retreated, apparently in cahoots with the attackers, for whom they left behind all the station’s weapons and ammunition. One of the station’s commanders, a former Haitian army soldier, is known to be close to fellow former soldier and rising opposition leader, Dany Toussaint, who recently defected from Aristide’s Lavalas Family party (FL).

Police complicity appears to have been involved in at least a few of the other town takeovers by the opposition. While reports are conflicting, the armed opposition appears to have, at least briefly, controlled about ten smaller towns, among them Trou du Nord, Saint-Raphaël, Dondon, Marchand-Dessalines, Ennery, Gros-Morne, L’Estère, Anse-Rouge, Petite Rivière de l’Artibonite, as well as Grand Goâve in the south. In many cases, public buildings and the homes of government officials or supporters were burned or looted. Reports of these takeovers, however real or brief, provided fuel for the panic which opposition controlled radio stations, and consequently their corporate media information dependents, have sought to spread."

Basically, before this all came down, they bought off part of Aristide's army so they would have thugs to blame it all on and tie it to Aristide. THE ARISTIDE "SUPPORTERS" running around doing the same kind of violence as the Fraph killers are actually part of the GANG and the main targets are LAvalas Party members and community organizers who are working with them, as well as members of other parties who have worked with them-everyone else dying is just incidental to the Surrogate Army-they want to create a sense of general lawlessness to terrorize everyone and convince the world that Haiti needs a regime change with US help because the blacks are just so violent, they can't run their own country. THIS IS NOT JUST ABOUT DEMOCRACY it is about RACISM -
Don't let this die! good dedicated people are dying right NOW and silence is complicity, propaganda is poison. Aristide's only message to his people and the world was that the "roots of the tree of peace grow deep, they are Louverturian" He called for peace. We can make the killing stop if we are loud enough, persistent enough. I have lived through so many coup d'etats in my lifetime while the world slept-this is the only the second one that I have been able to watch on the internet. I met MArtin Luther King Jr when I was about 8 years old-I will never forget what he said to me- "You can go anywhere you want, be anyone you want to be, BUT DON'T FORGET WHAT YOU KNOW, DON'T EVER FORGET WHAT YOU KNOW IS TRUE."

[Tinoire]

13. You met MLK?

"You can go anywhere you want, be anyone you want to be, BUT DON'T FORGET WHAT YOU KNOW, DON'T EVER FORGET WHAT YOU KNOW IS TRUE." MLK

Lucky child and fortunate person that you recall and LIVE what he said to you!

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

14. Thanks for posting. Powerful piece.

<snip>
Given its broad, if grudging, popular support, the government is unlikely to be overthrown by the rebels themselves. Foreign muscle may be needed for that.
<snip>

[Tinoire]

12. That is such a great read! They 've got Washington's number! n/t