statement on Haiti, February 2008

LASC Calls for End to UN Occupation of Haiti and Denounces Human Rights Abuses: Endorses HAC Call for Feb. 29 Actions

The Latin America Solidarity Coalition (LASC) endorses the call by the Haiti Action Committee (HAC) for widespread actions in the US and abroad on February 29, 2008, the fourth anniversary of the US-orchestrated, US Marine-led coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of President Jean Paul Aristide resulting in a continuing brutal occupation by a UN "peacekeeping" force enforcing US government interests in Haiti while repressing democratic forces.

The UN occupation force, known by its French acronym MINUSTAH, is shamefully commanded by Brazilian troops. The LASC supports progressive forces in Brazil which are demanding that their government not be complicit enforcer of the US government's imperialist policies in Haiti. Brazilian activists are particularly angry that the Lula government would play a leadership role in the occupation of a sovereign country in this hemisphere.

The LASC condemns the United Nations, Brazil, and the other countries which have provided troops for the military occupation of Haiti. Those troops allow the US war machine to enforce strategic goals over the Caribbean and Latin America while freeing US forces for the continued war against the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. The UN is even paying the salaries for the 9,000 soldiers from several nations when scarce peace-keeping funds are urgently needed for real peace-keeping missions in several areas of the world.

Under UN occupation, conditions in Haiti continue to deteriorate: recent headlines exposed that 10% (110 men) of an entire Sri Lankan MINUSTAH unit were expelled for sexual exploitation of young Haitian women and girls in a food for sex, prostitution scandal. Recently the Associated Press exposed the shameful fact that 4 years into a US-sanctioned, UN -backed military occupation, Haiti's poor are now resorting to mud cookies for food. Documentary film maker Kevin Pina and others have documented several massacres by UN troops seeking "bandits" in Haiti's vast slums. The LASC recognizes the 19 th century use of the word "bandits" as a label put on those who take up arms against US imperialism.

MINUSTAH presides over an occupation that favors US government interests in collaboration with the wealthy elite of Haiti. A program of repression against Fanmi Lavalas, the political party founded by Aristide and supported by a strong majority of Haitians when they have the opportunity to vote democratically, is underway, evidenced by over 1,000 political prisoners still in prison, and in the kidnapping of human rights advocate Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine. Haitian activists liken Lovinsky's disappearance to the operations of the old ton ton macoute (Duvalier era death/terror squads). Feb 12 marks the six-month anniversary of Lovinsky's disappearance. The LASC endorses HAC's day-long hunger fast that day and encourages supporters to continue to send letters, phone calls and faxes to the authorities demanding the safe return of Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine.

MINUSTAH operates with an annual budget of $500 million. Haiti's entire annual budget under Aristide was $300 million. Yet despite leading the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, the elected democratic government of Aristide/Fanmi Lavalas undertook a progressive social agenda that gave schools, markets, health care, infrastructure, hope and progress to Haiti's poor while still being forced by the US and Europe to pay off the odious debts of Papa Doc's dictatorship. MINUSTAH expenditures, in contrast, strengthen US hegemony over Haiti's affairs, bolster military/security forces, and finance monetary schemes and corruption that aim to destroy resistance to the occupation. Just to view the obscene new construction of a fancy new US Embassy and an enormous adjacent UN military encampment is to understand that this occupation intends to stay.

The other side of the coin is that Haiti's poor successfully developed a ten-year experiment in democracy and social progress, and the LASC supports their continued democratic struggle for sovereignty and self-determination. They are not victims of history. They have a sophisticated understanding of Western powers and a long history of resistance to foreign occupation and slavery. The immediate situation for the grassroots movement is difficult, yet there is both organized and popular resistance and dedicated activists working under dire circumstances. If there were ever a moment when international solidarity was critical, this is it.

The LASC encourages all people of good will to respond to HAC's call to organize events in support of Haiti's democracy movement on February 29, 2008 the 3rd International Day in Solidarity with the Haitian people. No event or action is considered too small. Report your plans to feb29@sonic.net so that they can be listed on the website www.haitisolidarity.net .

• End the US/UN Occupation - Respect Haiti's sovereignty

• Free the political prisoners - No more illegal arrests or prolonged detention without charges

• No more killings and sexual abuse of the poor by UN troops, police and paramilitaries under police control

• President Aristide must be free to return to Haiti - Respect the Haitian Constitution

• No more 'disappearances' - Work for the rule of law and the safe return of kidnapped Haitian human rights advocate Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine

• Launch an independent inquiry into the February 29, 2004 coup and forced removal of President Aristide

• Perpetrators of the coup and massacres of the poor must be brought to justice - Reparations for the victims

The LASC further encourages people and organizations who have partnerships with civil society and popular movements in countries providing troops for the UN occupation to contact those partners and encourage them to demand that their government pull out of the immoral occupation of Haiti. The countries providing military personnel are:

Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Croatia, Ecuador, France, Guatemala, Jordan, Nepal, Pakistan, Peru, Phillipines, Sri Lanka, United States and Uruguay.

Countries providing police personnel are:

Argentina, Benin, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, China, Colombia, DR Congo, Egypt, El Salvador, France, Grenada, Guinea, Jordan, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Romania, Russian Federation, Rwanda, Senegal, Spain, Sri Lanka, Togo, Turkey, United States and Uruguay

Adopted: February 2008 by the Latin America Solidarity Coalition Coordinating Committee

Stop Military & Economic Intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean

The Latin America Solidarity Coalition (LASC) is engaged in a joint multi-tactical campaign against U.S. Military and Economic Intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean. We operate and structure our work from a solidarity model: we operate on the principle of self-determination; it is not up to us to determine what our partners in the Global South should or should not do. Nor is it up to us to determine the strategies and methodologies they use. We determine our strategies based on the needs of our partners in Latin America and the Caribbean.

We have a lot to learn from our brothers and sisters throughout Latin America who have been fighting oppression for the past 510 years and who have recently ousted unjust corporate controlled presidents: Fernando de la Roea in Argentina, the Bolivian head of state Gonzalo S?nchez de Lozada, in Ecuador Jamil Mahuad, in Peru Alberto Fujimori. In 2002, popular protests in Venezuela toppled a US supported coup government after 48 hours and reinstated the democratically elected President Hugo Chavez.

Within the U.S., people are beginning to realize that U.S. government policy is not reflective of their own values and proclivities towards making peace. More and more people are starting to question US corporate and military actions. Increasingly citizens are joining the grassroots movements to stop US militarization and intervention in Latin America and worldwide, and to voice that this will not happen in our name. The Latin America Solidarity Coalition recognizes how many issues are inter-connected and that there is potential to make links between Latin America solidarity issues and the work of local community groups.

The Latin America Solidarity Coalition (LASC) is an association of national and local US-based grassroots Latin America and Caribbean solidarity groups. LASC’s goal is to serve as a sustainable point of political convergence to help build a truly progressive Latin America solidarity movement. We constitute a collective and democratic working space for collaboration, networking and the building of broad-reaching political organizing and mobilizing capacity in support of the people of Latin America struggling for justice and a better future for their countries free of economic, military and cultural imperialism. Join us!