[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 27 (Thursday, March 4, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2180-S2181]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         THE SITUATION IN HAITI

  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I want to take a few minutes this morning 
to address the issue of Haiti and the events that occurred there over 
the last few weeks. Haiti, a country, as colleagues know, is just off 
the coast of Florida. Sunday morning, the democratically elected 
president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was forced to leave office 
and his country on a U.S. aircraft. The armed rebellion, led by former 
members of the Haitian army, which I point out to colleagues was 
disbanded by President Aristide in 1994, and members of the 
paramilitary rightwing group called FRAPH, made it impossible for the 
Aristide government to maintain law and order.
  Unfortunately, President Aristide had little choice but to leave 
office, as the U.S. and international community made it very clear to 
him they would do nothing to protect him from the armed thugs and 
convicted murderers who had taken over most of the major cities in 
Haiti and terrorized and killed many people.
  I point out to my colleagues that President Aristide's departure is 
hardly a voluntary decision to leave. I had several communications with 
President Aristide, high-ranking members of our administration, and 
other Members of Congress over the weekend.
  On Monday, I had a very lengthy conversation with President Aristide, 
who had called me from the Central African Republic. I was very 
disturbed about reports that were circulating that he had been forcibly 
removed from the President's palace, put on an aircraft, and flown out 
of Haiti. Some of this now has been talked about in terms of whether or 
not he was at gunpoint or how was he forced out.
  The administration is taking the position that he voluntarily 
resigned and got on the aircraft and they flew him out of the country. 
There are others who are saying that perhaps he was forced out at 
gunpoint.
  After my long conversation with President Aristide on Monday 
afternoon, I am convinced of at least three things. One, President 
Aristide was not put in handcuffs. He was not marched at the end of a 
rifle and told to get on the airplane or they would shoot him. No, that 
did not occur. So in that contextual framework he was not ``forced,'' 
``abducted,'' or ``kidnapped'' out of the country.
  On the other hand, during the late afternoon of Saturday, after I had 
spoken with him, in the evening hours of that same Saturday, he was 
contacted by our ambassador in Haiti who, according to Mr. Aristide, 
told him he had basically three options: He could stay in Haiti and be 
killed and thus precipitate a bloodshed that might cost thousands of 
lives because we would do nothing to protect him from the armed thugs 
and the killers; secondly, he could leave with bloodshed, that is, he 
could leave after precipitating a crisis that might cost thousands of 
lives; or he could leave without bloodshed.
  Confronted with those options, if a President such as Aristide, who 
is democratically elected, leaves, is that voluntary? As Congressman 
Rangel said yesterday in a hearing: Under a threat to his life, Mr. 
Aristide had little choice but to sign a resignation letter. I would 
have signed one, too, Congressman Rangel said.
  That is the essence of what happened. Our Government basically left 
Mr. Aristide, a democratically elected President, with no options. 
Either leave with bloodshed or leave without bloodshed, but in either 
case he was leaving.
  As President Aristide told me, he had an obligation to the Haitian 
people. He did not want to see bloodshed. He did not want to see 
thousands of innocent people killed. So, therefore, under that kind of 
duress he was forced to leave.
  I was asked why the United States did not honor the Santiago treaty 
in 1991 signed by the United States, which clearly states that any 
government democratically elected in the Western Hemisphere that seeks 
the support of other Organization of American States member nations, 
when threatened with an overthrow, will be assisted? That agreement was 
signed by the first President Bush in 1991.
  I point out a couple of things. When President Aristide was first 
elected in 1990, he served for a total of about 8 months, from about 
January through August of 1991, and then was overthrown by a military 
coup.
  What did the first President Bush administration do? Absolutely 
nothing. They let the military take over and throw out a democratically 
elected President, at the same time that the first President Bush was 
signing the Santiago Resolution saying we would come to the assistance 
of a democratically elected government in our hemisphere if they were 
threatened with an overthrow.

  Then President Clinton came to office the following year and we 
restored President Aristide to office. He had about 1 year left, 
because he agreed that the 3 years he spent in exile would count toward 
his 5-year tenure. Under the Constitution of Haiti, a President cannot 
succeed himself. Mr. Aristide agreed that he would abide by the 
constitution.
  So when he came back to Haiti, he served about 1 more year and then 
elections were held in 1995 and he did not run, of course, because the 
Constitution would not let him do so. During the year he was back in 
Haiti, he did one significant thing. He disbanded the Haitian Army, the 
army that had been used for probably as much as 100 years to repress 
and suppress the people of Haiti. The Army had been used by one 
dictator after another to suppress the legitimate aspirations of the 
Haitian people.
  After he had done that, he called me up. I remember that phone call 
very well when President Aristide called and said he was soon to leave 
office and had decided to disband the Haitian Army. I remember him 
telling me he did it for a couple of reasons.
  President Aristide told me that Haiti did not need a military. The 
military had been used to repress the people. No one is going to invade 
us. He said they wanted to be like Costa Rica, that did not have an 
army and they did not need one.
  Secondly, he said the military in Haiti did nothing but repress 
people. The military had been using up about half of the GDP of Haiti 
to pay for these military thugs.
  Well, guess who is leading the insurgency against Aristide now? 
Former leaders of the old Haitian military, many of whom had left the 
country, at least one of whom had been Chamblain. He had been convicted 
in absentia because he fled the country. He had been

[[Page S2181]]

convicted of at least two murders, one of Guy Malary, who was a Justice 
Minister assassinated on the steps of the justice building in broad 
daylight by Mr. Chamblain and his thugs.
  Mr. Chamblain, who was convicted in absentia of murder, is now one of 
the rebel leaders in Haiti. Guy Philippe who we keep seeing on 
television, is also a rebel leader. Amnesty International said he had 
turned a blind eye to many extrajudicial killings and murders committed 
by police under his command.
  Well, I hope and trust that we do not support these people. I noticed 
in the hearing the other day in the House, Mr. Noriega, the Assistant 
Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere, said we did not support the 
violent overthrow of that man, referring to Mr. Aristide.
  Well, I am sorry, Mr. Noriega, you are wrong. The United States aided 
and abetted, in more ways than one, the overthrow of a democratically 
elected government. We need some investigations.
  What happened to all of the arms that we sent to the Dominican 
Republic in the last couple of years to patrol the border between the 
Dominican Republic and Haiti for drug smuggling? Reports are coming out 
that many of these arms we sent down there are now in Haiti in the 
hands of these killers and thugs: flack jackets, helmets, rifles, night 
vision goggles.
  I don't know if it is true or not, but I am saying there are many 
reports that these arms we sent down there are in the hands of the 
armed insurgents, former members of the former Haitian military. How 
did they get their hands on these arms?
  As Richard Holbrooke, our former Ambassador to the United Nations, 
said on a Sunday morning talk show, these individuals have a long 
history of murder and terror when they were members of the Haitian 
military. He said they have a long history of involvement with our 
intelligence services in the United States.
  This needs to be investigated.
  The New York Times today reported that the political crisis in Haiti 
is deepening. Prime Minister Neptune has declared a state of emergency 
and has suspended many of the rights to the Haitian people guaranteed 
by their constitution.
  The Bush administration withdrew its support from the Aristide 
government because it said it was a ``government of failed 
leadership.''
  I guess we get to decide whether a democractically elected government 
is failing or not. And if we don't like them, we have the right to go 
ahead and let armed thugs take over that government.
  I tell you, the Bush administration has a lot to answer for, and will 
have a lot to answer for because of what has happened and what is 
happening in Haiti today.
  President Aristide is gone, forced out of office, and the Bush 
administration continues to sit on the sidelines and wring its hands 
while innocent people in Haiti continue to be killed.
  I call on the administration to truly make a commitment to stabilize 
the security situation in Haiti by first instructing the Multinational 
Interim Force to collect the weapons used by the rebels who said they 
would disarm. If this vital step is not taken now, we are only setting 
ourselves and the Haitian people up for another disaster. The mandate 
is clear. The Multinational Interim Force should immediately disarm and 
arrest these thugs.
  The failure to disarm the disbanded Haitian military and the 
paramilitary forces called FRAPH in 1994 after President Aristide had 
come back to office has been one of the root causes of ongoing 
political violence in Haiti.
  We know who these thugs are and we have the mandate to arrest and 
turn them over to the Haitian authorities. We have arrested Baathists 
members of Saddam Hussein's party. We have arrested them and turned 
them over to the Iraqi courts. We also did this in the Balkans. Why 
can't we do it in Haiti? We cannot go out and arrest Mr. Chamblain, 
convicted of two murders? Why don't we go out and arrest him and turn 
him over to the Haitian courts to stand trial?
  Let us show the Haitian people we are committed to ensuring that the 
democratic process works--not just in Iraq, not just in the Balkans, 
but also in Haiti as well.
  The Bush administration can no longer sit on the sidelines. It is my 
hope the Bush administration shows the same dedication and commitment 
to supporting the new interim government as it did to stand by and 
actively destroy President Aristide's duly elected democratic 
government.

  What has happened in Haiti should be a blight on the American 
conscience--the poorest country in this hemisphere, the poorest of the 
poor, struggling decade after decade under brutal dictatorships, 
repressive military regimes, finally becoming free in 1990, only to 
have its President overthrown in a coup. What signal are we sending to 
the Haitians? I guess if you are poor and you don't have oil and you 
are not strategically important, we don't care what happens to you. We 
will let the thugs take over. We will let the few wealthy elite rearm 
the military to protect them and to keep them in power.
  I saw a newspaper article late last week which pointed out that this 
Congress had appropriated $18 billion for reconstruction in Iraq. It 
went on to say how $4 billion of the money that was appropriated for 
Iraq was for clean water and sanitation--$4 billion of our taxpayers' 
money going to one of the wealthiest countries in the world, Iraq. Iraq 
is not a poor country. This is a very rich country with oil reserves. 
It is either the first or second in the world in oil reserves. Yet we 
are taking $4 billion in taxpayer money to build a water and sanitation 
system. Why can't we build clean water and sanitation systems, roads, 
hospitals and schools in Haiti? To me, that is the moral imperative of 
what we should be doing in our hemisphere--not trying to destroy 
democratically elected governments.
  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Murkowski). The Senator from Missouri.

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