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Outsiders EXPECT burning tires in Haiti … not accurate reporting
September 28, 2012
Friday, Sept. 21, saw yet another in a series of large demonstrations across Haiti against what many protestors called “the corruption of the Martelly regime.” Not a single U.S. news outlet filed a story in English on the demonstrations. Most conspicuously absent in their coverage was The Miami Herald.
Book exposes violent role of paramilitaries in Haiti
September 7, 2012
Haiti’s brutal army was disbanded in 1995, yet armed and uniformed paramilitaries, with no government affiliation, occupy former army bases today. Join Haiti Action Committee for a discussion on the roots of paramilitarism in Haiti at La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley, featuring Jeb Sprague, author of ‘Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in Haiti.’
Haiti: They don’t have bread? Give ‘em carnival
September 6, 2012
In 2012, the Maafa is a penal colony in U.S.-occupied Haiti – the national penitentiary. This image expresses a reality reminiscent of chained Africans in the hull of a slave ship bound for the Carolinas. In Haiti, prisoners without human rights are guarded by the world arbiters on human rights, the United Nations. This is how prisoners are treated. Forgotten and abandoned.
The UN’s cholera epidemic in Haiti
August 26, 2012
More than 70 percent of Haitians responding to a recent poll said they wanted MINUSTAH to leave within a year. The U.N. can use the money currently wasted on this military force to rid the country of cholera. Then, at least, they will have cleaned up one of their biggest crimes in the country.
Signs of the times in Haiti: The military, money and meaning of an occupation
August 15, 2012
There are periods in a country’s history when the signs and warnings that that history will soon enter into a dramatically different phase are clear as day. Such is the period today in Haiti, where daily events portend an inauspicious development for the future: The Haitian Army may soon be returning.
Venezuela: a threat to Washington?
July 31, 2012
From the first time Hugo Chavez was elected president of Venezuela in 1998, Washington and its allies have been trying to undermine his government. Is Venezuela a threat to Washington? No, Venezuela is an example of how a rising people can build a model where social justice reigns and human prosperity is cherished above economic wealth.
Massacre at La Visite
July 30, 2012
During the week of July 15, 2012, Haitian officials ordered a group of residents of La Visite Park to evacuate the area. On Monday, July 23, around noon, 36 commandos arrived in La Visite Park to evict 142 families, who fought back with stones in a battle that lasted four hours. Dozens were injured. Initial reports noted that four children were shot dead along with eight adults.
Poor little rich Haiti to be fleeced of copper-silver-gold via Caracol deep-water port
May 15, 2012
The real plan for Haiti’s northeastern region – especially the Caracol Bay area – is one that was hatched by Canadian mining corporations, with the U.S. and South Korean sweatshop zone being a side project and distraction. If this mining plan is given a green light while Haiti is under foreign occupation, it will permanently strip the country of much of its mineral, cultural and ecological wealth.
Paramilitary gangs join UN force in preying on Haitian population
May 12, 2012
by Dady Chery, Haiti Chery
Members of the dissolved Haitian army parade at Camp Lamantin, a former military base in Port-au-Prince. – Photo: Ramon Espinosa, AP
For several weeks, armed groups of young Black men, presumably Haitian and too young… Read the rest »
The character assassination of Samba Boukman
March 12, 2012
Portraying community and political activists as violent gang leaders and violent criminals was employed in the run-up to Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s ouster in 2004 and gained momentum in the years afterwards. The continued demonization of militants and activists is exemplified in the defamation campaign against grassroots activist Samba Boukman.
Tribute to Jean Ristil Jean Baptiste
March 1, 2012
On Saturday, March 3, 4-6 p.m., Haiti Action Committee invites you to an afternoon of solidarity with the Haitian people to mark the eighth anniversary of the Feb. 29, 2004, coup d’etat, dedicated to the memory of Jean Ristil Jean-Baptiste, at La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley. Jean Ristil lived his entire life in Cite Soleil. He was jailed, persecuted, beaten many times for his work as a photojournalist. He fought hard to give voice to the voiceless. He had stubborn determination. He hustled, he had game, he refused to be defeated. His work and courage remain to inspire us, to keep us going forward.
Haiti’s elected mayors illegally replaced by presidential appointees
February 27, 2012
The 1987 Constitution has not only thwarted a return to a dictatorship, but also prevented foreign concerns from buying the country wholesale from officials of the executive branch. One of the proposed amendments to the 1987 Constitution stated: “From now on, until the municipal elections of 2013, all Haiti’s mayors will be replaced by ‘Municipal Agents’ designated by the central government.”
For a revolutionary Black History Month
February 21, 2012
Africans in Haiti, by the tens of thousands, broke their chains and though penniless, hungry and scarred by the ravages of bondage, found weapons and the will to fight for freedom against the defenders of slavery: France, Britain, and Spain. They did what no “slave” army had ever done in modern or ancient history. They defeated an empire.
Haiti: Seven places where the earthquake money did and did not go
January 12, 2012
The U.N. estimated international donors gave Haiti over $1.6 billion in relief aid since the earthquake – about $155 per Haitian – and over $2 billion in recovery aid – about $173 per Haitian – over the last two years. Yet Haiti looks like the earthquake happened two months ago, not two years.
Aid as a Trojan horse: On the anniversary of the Haitian earthquake
January 11, 2012
In the ’60s, Haiti thrived with style and panache, brimming with laughter, flavor, music and color. Things dear to the Haitian soul were valued – things that could not be bought. Aid required that Haiti’s economy be changed – to benefit the U.S. Yes, the earthquake has hurt Haiti, but capitalism has hurt it more. Don’t miss the premiere of “Haiti Rising from the Ashes,” a dynamic new film by young pan-Africans Chris Zamani, M.D., Minister of Information JR and filmmaker Siraj Fowler, 7 p.m., at Twin Space Continuum, 2111 Mission St., third floor, San Francisco.
Report from Haiti: Where’s the money?
December 28, 2011
Broken and collapsed buildings remain in every neighborhood. Men pull oxcarts by hand through the street. Women carry 5-gallon plastic jugs of water on their heads, dipped from manhole covers in the street. Women carry 5-gallon plastic jugs of water on their heads, dipped from manhole covers in the street.
What happens in Haiti doesn’t stay in Haiti
December 8, 2011
The “peacekeepers” are the fastest-growing branch of the U.N., with a budget of U.S. $8 billion and over 110,000 troops serving 15 operations. Ten percent of this budget is spent on Haiti – a small country that is not at war – to train foreign troops for future warfare against their own civilians.
The uses of Haiti’s poor children: Guinea pigs for cholera vaccines
November 8, 2011
Haiti’s Ministry of Health finally gave in and officially announced the beginning of a vaccination campaign against cholera, after one year of pressure from the United Nations’ Pan American Health Organization and the recent takeover of Haiti’s prime-ministerial position by Clinton aide and U.N. employee Garry Conille. Cholera is eminently curable, and the cure is clean water.
Why it took 11 months instead of three weeks to show that Haiti’s cholera is Nepalese
September 25, 2011
It took nearly a year since the start of Haiti’s cholera epidemic for scientists to get conclusive proof that the cholera bacteria in Haiti are identical to bacteria in Nepal. The only reason it took so long to discover that Haiti’s cholera came from Nepal is because scientists had until now not bothered to compare the cholera from Haiti to cholera from Nepal.
Marthe Enice Cassandre St. Vil: Haitian family needs our help
September 20, 2011
In August 2010, I met Cassandre, a young woman who had been raped. Her father had been putting her through university, so when he was killed, her dreams died too. Kamau Amen Ra volunteered to support her in her dream to become an accountant. Now she, her mother and grandmother need help to move from their tent camp to an apartment.