Haiti Justice Blog

Time to Deal with Haiti

Paul Farmer and Brian Concannon | April 21, 2009

Editor: Emira Woods and Emily Schwartz Greco

Foreign Policy In Focus

www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/6062

When President Barack Obama went to Trinidad for the Summit of Americas, he brought the promise of "change" to a Latin America policy that has brought suffering to our neighbors while reducing U.S. influence and moral standing in the hemisphere. Change would be especially welcome to Haitians, who have suffered their usual unfair share of political and economic instability from these policies. But Haitians are still waiting to see whether the promised change will extend beyond ending the illegal and destructive policies of the last eight years, and include a shift away from U.S. policies that have failed both our oldest neighbor and our highest ideals for over two centuries.

Change Haiti can believe in

The Boston Globe

By Paul Farmer and Brian Concannon  |  January 25, 2009

THE INAUGURATION of a US president committed to reversing "the failed policies of the past" provoked sighs of relief around the world. Few were more relieved than the citizens of Haiti, because few have suffered so much from failed US policies. But Haitians are still waiting to see whether the "past" that is to be reversed extends beyond the illegal and destructive policies of the last eight years to include over two centuries of US policies that have failed both our oldest neighbor and our highest ideals.

Our treatment of Haiti was bad enough during the Bush administration. We imposed a development assistance embargo in 2001, because we did not like the elected government's economic policies. The embargo stopped urgently needed government programs - a Partners In Health study found that cancelling water projects in just one city had a devastating impact on health in the area. In 2004, US officials forced Haiti President Jean-Bertrand Aristide aboard a clandestine flight to Africa and placed a Bush supporter from Florida at the head of Haiti's government. Thousands were killed in the ensuing political violence. Years of hard-won progress toward democracy were erased overnight.

Haiti Debt Relief Conditions Add Injustice to Injury

Current Debt

Over half of Haiti’s $1.4 billion current debt is for loans granted to Haiti’s past dictatorships. These loans were misappropriated to finance lavish lifestyles and brutally oppressive holds on power. These thefts were widely reported, yet the loans continued.

Because of this odious debt (collected by illegitimate means and/or used for illegal purposes, repression, or crimes against humanity), Haiti has been forced to pay $631 million in payments to creditors since 1991. In 2005-06, Haiti’s health budget of $25 million was less than half the amount spent on debt service payments. 

These financial institutions recognize the injustice of Haiti’s debt, and have, in principle, already agreed to cancel it. However, under the process proposed, Haiti must wait at least three years before cancellation, during which it will be forced to divert $270 million to debt payments and implement painful economic changes.

Solidaridad? Haiti, MINUSTAH and Latin America

Americas Program, International Relations Center (IRC)
Click here for PDF Version
Photos by Wadner Pierre and John Carroll

Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez found a hero's welcome when he visited Haiti on March 12. People from Port-au-Prince's poor neighborhoods lined the streets of the capitol to cheer, chant, dance, and sing, with all the infectious enthusiasm of Haitian celebrations. President Chávez returned the affection. He jumped from his motorcade and joined the party, marching, even running with the crowd. At the National Palace, Chávez climbed up on the perimeter fence to slap hands like he had just scored a World Cup goal. He publicly thanked the Haitian people for their hospitality and enthusiasm, and for their historic support for liberty in the world.

Last Word on The Lancet Controversy

The British Medical Journal The Lancet has finally confirmed the findings of the study it published August 31, 2006, Human Rights and Other Criminal Violations in Port-au-Prince, Haiti: A Random Survey of Households. The survey documented what grassroots groups and independent human rights organizations had been saying for over two years: that Haiti's Interim Government and its paramilitary allies had been waging a war on Haiti's pro-democracy movement. Those who had been denying the other reports waged a campaign to discredit the Household Survey not by criticizing its findings, but by  attacking the author (for more on the controversy, click here, for a video of a January 2007 talk by the study's authors, click here ).

After an investigation by the Lancet and by Wayne State University, the Lancet concluded that it "has confidence in Kolbe and Hutson's findings as published" (see full article below). The journal did find that one of the authors, Athena Kolbe, should have disclosed that she had previously written on Haiti under the name Lyn Duff.

That lack of disclosure did not affect the findings of massive human rights violations against Haiti's pro-democracy movement in any way. But the attacks on Ms. Kolbe did succeed- as the Lancet noted, it "has obscured the message of Kolbe and Hutson's research and detracted from the real issue-the welfare of civilians in Haiti-to whom attention should now turn."

Haiti: Another UN Massacre in CIte Soleil

We are receiving disturbing reports of another Massacre in Cite Soleil by MINUSTAH troops on Friday. Some report as many as twenty dead. MINUSTAH, as in previous deadly raids, said it only killed "bandits."

I am traveling this weekend, with intermittent internet access, but I'll get as much as I can up on this blog. The best mainstream report I've seen so far is Reuters: At Least Nine Killed in Haitian Slum Raid.

HURAH (Human Rights Accompaniment in Haiti) has issued a report from the Haitian human rights group AUMOHD, based on AUMOHD's Community Human Rights Council representatives in Cite Soleil
(see http://www.hurah.revolt.org). The full text of that report is below.

If We Fail to Act by Paul Farmer

[Ed. note: This piece by Dr. Paul Farmer from Notre Dame Magazine is a must-read for anyone looking for serious solutions to poverty, illness and the other social problems that afflict people in Haiti and in poor countries like it. The two photos here illustrate the despair these problems cause, but also the hope that the attainable solutions can bring. The photos depict the same person, Joseph, an AIDS survivor in Haiti].

As a physician who has battled infectious diseases in Haiti, Rwanda and elsewhere, I know we are in the midst of a staggering wave of killing, one that brings to question all notions of moral values. The numbers alone are telling. Even if we consider only the big three infectious killers -- AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria -- we are faced with tens of millions of preventable deaths slated to occur during our lifetimes. A recent document from the United Nations suggests, for example, that more than 80 million Africans might die from AIDS alone by 2025. A similar toll will be taken, on that continent, by tuberculosis and malaria. Adding other infectious killers to the list, the butcher's bill totals hundreds of millions of deaths over the next few decades.              

Have these numbers lost their ability to shock or even move us? What are the human values in question when we hear, and fail to react to, the news that each day thousands die of these maladies unattended? Where, amid all these numbers, is the human face of suffering? What values might guide our response to such suffering?

Click for Full Article

HOPE Act- Response to Robert

Thanks Robert, for pointing out the importance of jobs, to Haitian workers and their families and communities (posted under "US Elections and Haiti- what has been won?"). I think few would argue with the premise that creating more jobs, through HOPE or any other means, would make a real difference for people in Haiti. And in a narrow sense the changes made by HOPE- allowing Haitian garment manufacturers to use cheaper fabric imported from China or elsewhere- will cause little harm in Haiti.

The real problems with HOPE are that 1) it misses an opportunity to do better; and 2) it supports a flawed model of economic development that has failed Haiti for 2 decades.

Haiti’s Local Elections: What the Citizens Think

by Wadner Pierre
Bureau des Avocats Internationaux
December 1, 2006

Two days before the holding of local elections throughout the country, do all the citizens have the same opinions about December 3?

Haiti’s Stealth Elections: What’s At Stake?

Tomorrow Haitians will vote in historic elections that are as ignored as they are important. Although they are receiving little attention in the foreign, and even Haitian press, the elections will establish, for the first time in nineteen years, the radically democratic and decentralized foundation of Haiti’s 1987 Constitution.