March through December 2000 news briefing & analysis this month

Welcome To WeHaitians NewsLibrary ... News Briefing & Analysis This Month, March through December 2000

Compiled and written by Prof. Yves A. Isidor. Other staff members assisted with the following reports. Correspond with the concerned parties via electronic mail: wehaitianspol@aol.com

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- At least eight are believed dead as freighter hit the seabed off Florida --- A 163-foot cargo vessel with at least eight crew members on board hit the seabed Monday a few hours after leaving Florida for Haiti, the U.S. Coast Guard said. Since all crew members were believed dead the Coast Guard suspended its air and sea search.

- Hundreds say a final goodbye to 13-year-old Haitian boy in Miami --- Like many other Haitian families, which emigrate from Haiti to the U.S., Rose Murat, 41, whose diabetic husband expired in April, had big dreams for her son Stanley Murat. Mrs. Murat's dreams for her son Stanley included going first to College and then to medical school or law school. But on Dec.11, those dreams abruptly came to an end after her 5-year-old nephew, Junior, found Stanley hanging from a rope on their second-floor balcony apartment in the Miami's section of Little Haiti. Stanley, was 10 when he arrived in the U.S. from Haiti. He was constantly in trouble at school for disrupting his eight-grade class by standing on his desk and running out of the classroom.. Many Miami Haitians, who are tormented about the way young Stanley terminated his life, said he was a depressed boy. Others attributed his prematured death to cultural gap and voodoo. Sadly, as other teens of Stanley's age are preparing to celebrate Christmas and then welcome the new year, his mother Rose, a housekeeper, hundreds of Miami Haitians and Americans today said a final goodbye to him as he was being interred.

- Clinton still hopes to put an end to Haiti's political crisis before leaving office --- A military adage holds that a man under fire will show the best or the worst side of his character. Leftist and chief bandit Jean-Bertrand Aristide who has been under fire since 10 of his Lavalas Family party's Senators were fraudulently elected in a May election showed the worst side of his character when he was again elected president in a sham election on November 26th. And, probably he will soon show more of it when he permanently adds to his list a few more political opponents' names after they are gunned down in broad daylight by his paid bandits. All international aid for Haiti has been suspended since the largely fraudulent May vote. The International community has since repeatedly demanded for a recount so the exact number of Aristide's Lavalas Family party senate candidates who did not face a run-off into elections can be determined. The opposition itself continues to call all of the elections "fraudulent" and vows to evict the new Senators - all members of Aristide's party - from the parliament building. Not long ago, it made its intentions known to install an alternative government on February 7th when leftist Aristide is supposed to again officially become Haiti's first citizen. What's else figures on the opposition's long list of demands? Current leftist and ineffective Haitian president Rene Preval, an Arisitide' godson, must resign immediately. But U.S. President William Jefferson Clinton, sensing that he can help put an end to Haiti's political crisis before leaving office on January 20th, dispatched Anthony Lake, a former official of his government to Haiti Wednesday. Donald Steinberg, a current U.S. official who also traveled to the troubled Caribbean nation together with Lake met with Haiti's leftist President, Rene Preval, minutes after they arrived there. They also conferred with leftist Aristide, representatives of Haiti's private sector and opposition leaders. All, were in an effort to put end to Haiti's political crisis. And, an official of the European Union for the Americas who also hopes for an end to Haiti's political crisis, met Wednesday with leftist Preval during his brief visit in Haiti. "The European Union hopes to come to aid more to the poor people of Haiti," said Mr. Renaud Vignal." Added Mr.Vignal, "Our financial assistance, which Haiti largely needs, will remain suspended if the problems raised by the Organization of American States about the May 21th elections are not addressed."

- Aristide's opponent murdered in Haiti --- Wood Tenor, a former opponent of leftist Jean-Bertrand Aristide and Congressman, was shot to death Wednesday at his private residence in Port-au-Prince. Tenor, who went back to his profession of civil engineer after leftist Haitian President Rene Preval illegally dissolved Parliament slightly more than two years ago only to start governing by decree, was an unfortunate candidate for the House of Deputies in the largely May 21st. fraudulent elections.

- Leftist Aristide Lavalas Family party's Senators boycotted anti-narcotics session in parliament --- Contested Haitian Senators Danny Toussaint, Florel Celestin, Joseph Medard and many of their colleagues, including leftist chief bandit Jean-Bertrand Aristide, are symbols of the narcotics industry in Haiti. They represent the dream of a bigger narcotics industry in the dirt poor Caribbean nation, nurtured by an increase in the quantity of narcotics that is consumed in the U.S, of which 14% transits via Haiti. The contested Senators again led their dream known Tuesday when they failed to show up for a vote on issues related to anti-narcotics laws in the largely illegal parliament causing the lack of a quorum to force the very few of the imposter Senators who were in attendance to call it quit.

- Former hospital worker Marlene Honore may not be a guest at your Christmas or New Year's eve party --- If you have not already sent the invitations out for this year Christmas or New Year eve party you might save yourselves some money when you do so in the next very few days because Marlene Honore, 25, may not be one of your guests. A former Dana-Farber Cancer Institute receptionist, Honore was taken out of the circulation Monday in the same Boston's courtroom where she was charged with 42 counts of identification fraud, which were not limited to the theft of personal data from patients at the institute. Bail for Honore, who also faces witness intimidation charges, was set at $2,500.

- Haiti's Catholic Church preoccupied by Haiti's painful situation --- In a long awaited message Sunday Haiti's Catholic bishops expressed their concerns about the country's continuing culture of violence, which has caused anguish and consternation among the Haitian population, they said. The bishops urged all Haitians to work together to change the current social fabric, which they said was unacceptable in the Caribbean nation of 7.8 million citizens. Interviewed by Haitian journalists about the message, which was welcomed by all democratic forces in the country, while the Lavalas Family party of leftist Jean-Bertrand Aristide, better known as the party of terror the world over, said nothing at all, the president of Haiti's Episcopal Conference or Conference Episcopal (CEH), as it is known in French, Monsignor Hubert Constant, who urged all Haitians to be sincere and honest with themselves as they work for peace said "things can no longer remain the way they are. The mentality in this country must change, and this must be done without violence. Haitians can longer afford to be divided, and it is time for them to turn to dialogue, if they are to solve the nation's problems." The bishops' condemnation of violence came less than twenty four hours after two people were gunned down in broad daylight near the City of Leogane, 20 miles south of the capital city of Port-au-Prince, and less than 48 hours after a sports journalist, Gerard Denoze, 34, was shot to death by two boys as he exited a taxi Friday afternoon in the Port-au-Prince bidonville or slum of Carrefour.

- Haitian opposition to install a parallel government --- Not surprising, when you are fraudulently elected president you can expert the reaction of a serious opposition to be more than just crying fraud. The Haitian opposition, known as the Democratic Convergence Alliance, said Friday it will install a parallel national provisional government before leftist Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was fraudulently elected president on Nov. 26, assumes the office of the presidency in Haiti on February 7. The said government, said the opposition, will organize general elections in which a legitimate president will be chosen, too. Was leftist Aristide not a third world little village chief bandit he would invite the opposition to take lecture of his political and economic program. But Aristide, who controls all but one seat in the 27-member Senate, more than 80 percent of the seats in the Chamber of Deputies, nearly all City Halls, and town councils nationwide, said Friday via his spokesperson, Yvon Neptune, "the opposition should respect the democratic process." What democratic process? Most Haitians had a hard time comprehending what exactly Neptune meant by such contention because all they have known over the past ten years or so is the dictatorship of the proletariat. Concurrently with the above, first leftist Aristide who burned alive and assassinated in broad day light an incalculable number of political opponents, now leftist Rene Preval who has done the same and is said to be in office but not on power, and soon Aristide again meaning more political opponents will be burned alive and assassinated in broad daylight. The February 7 swearing-in ceremony, when Aristide will again officially assume the executive office of the presidency, will simply be a formality since Preval is just the filling in an Aristide's sandwich.

- Three alleged witchcraft practitioners burned alive in Haiti --- If you are a witchcraft practitioner stay away from Haiti. If not you will suffer the same fate as the three alleged witchcraft practitioners who were burned alive this week in the town of Saint-Louis du Sud in Haiti by a handful citizens of that town.

New Bedford - A proposal law local leaders and immigrants thought would stem the flow of controversial deportations here has been killed by Republican senators. Texas Republican Sen. Phil Gramm demanded yesterday that a bipartisan bill passed in September by the House of Representatives be stricken from a year-end appropriations bill. The proposed law would have repealed some of the most severe portions of a 1996 federal act that made deportations quicker, and allowed longtime legal immigrants to be permanently expelled from the country for relatively minor crimes committed years, or even decades, ago. For U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., who has three times tried and failed to "fix 96," the death of the latest bill he shepherded through the House was a blow. "This viscous assault on immigrants has already gone on too long, and can never be undone," said Rep. Frank. "I will do what I can in the next Congress, but I am deeply regretful that the Republican leadership refused to work with us now." The move effectively eliminates any chance of deportation reform until at least next year, when the new U.S. Congress is seated. And advocates like Mr. Frank and others worry that the election of Texan Republican George W. Bush as president will diminish chances for a new push next year, or in the years to come. "The truth is we don't know yet about Bush," said Jim Manley, aid to Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. Bush ran on a platform of being a uniter, not a divider. The immigration issue is a chance for him to prove if he means that or not." Helena Marquez, of the Immigrants Assistance Center, was saddened by the news. A support group of families of residents deported under the 1996 law is holding a vigil tonight outside the Dartmouth House of Corrections, where many local residents begin their journey back to their native countries. "I'm just very upset," she said. "All the steps forward we thought we were taking ... we've just been pushed back" The last-minute turnaround in Washington yesterday came as something of a surprise for many who thought the fight to ease the immigration and deportation laws had already been won. Ms. Marques said news of the bill's early success had prompted phone calls from overseas expressing relief. "We were getting phone calls from agencies in Portugal, the government in Portugal, saying they were so glad a change had been made," she said. Families of residents already deported also had been encouraged by some of the bill's language. Early versions of the new law would have made it possible for people deported under the retroactive portions of the 1996 act to apply for return to the United States. That change is no longer being considered. "The families are going to be devastated," said Ms. Marques. Over the past two years, many of the same lawmakers who passed the stringent 1996 Immigration Reform Act have come to see it as overly harsh and responsible for breaking up families. Republican Reps. Bill McCollom of Florida and Lamar Smith of Texas were both considered formidable opponents of reform of the 1996 act, which became part of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996. Both supported the act's passage in 1996, but both later reversed their stands on much of the act and co-sponsored the so-called Frank-McCollom bill that gave hope to many immigrants families. Locally, hundreds of legal immigrants have been deported since 1996, mainly to the Portuguese mid-Atlantic islands of the Azores. The plight of the families left behind and the problems it has caused in the Azores elicited support for reform from some unlikely quarters. Bristol County Sheriff Thomas M. Hodgson - a Republican known for his tough jail policies - traveled to Washington, D.C. three times recently to lobby Republican lawmakers to support the repeal of the 1996 act. Yesterday, the sheriff said he spent much of the week working the phones to Washington and soliciting letters of support for the changes from Bishop Sean P. O'Malley and the state's former governor, William Weld, a Republican. "It's very frustrating," he said of the bill's death. "I can only guess that (Sen. Gramm) doesn't understand some of the hardships that this law has caused." Sen. Gramm's office yesterday issued a statement that cited his support of several other immigrant bills - one would expand H-1B visas for foreign nationals who bring needed skills and expertise to America - and defended his stand on the 1996 law. "I will not champion the passage of legislation which invites people to break the law to get here, or let them break the law and stay here," wrote Sen. Gramm. Congressman Frank and Sen. Kennedy's office said they will file new versions of the bill as soon possible after the new Congress meets. * Note: Again, this is not a WeHaitians' article, but that of the Standard-Times. Still, if you download it or receive a copy of it from someone who first obtained it from our Web site and then use it for your radio and/or television news magazine program please mention www.wehaitians.com as your source - sure will we appreciate it. This article appeared on the front page of the Standard-Times on December 16, 2000. We republished it in its entity since we continue to receive hundreds of e-mails on issues related to the 1996 immigration law.

- Pope John Paul and Haiti's World Bank representative call for unity among Haitians --- Like a broken family whose one member would fraudulently share the inheritance with another one he shares the same Marxist philosophy with rather than all of the other heirs who believe in capitalism, too, leftist Haitian President Rene Preval organized on Nov. 26th a presidential masquerade with the sole purpose of consolidating the dictatorship of the proletariat instituted by leftist Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Leftist Aristide himself, who many said behaved like a third world village chief bandit, fortified a campaign of terror in an effort to prevent members of the Haitian opposition from participating in the presidential electoral process. As anticipated, he was said to win the office of presidency with 92% of the votes cast. Why not 100%? But prior to the presidential electoral farce,10 of his senators were fraudulently elected in an election held in May. Once again, this week, opposition leaders vowed to evict his party members, who they called "contested senators and imposters," from the parliament building, and call for new general elections, which will include the executive office of the presidency. Pope John Paul, realizing how divided Haitians have become since Aristide pocketed results for all of the elections, called upon them all Wednesday in a Christmas message to show signs of compromise and work for a sincere dialogue among themselves, as Christ would have done, until the end of the world. He recalled Haitians of his 1983 visit in Haiti when he urged them all to take a look, with courage, at their suffering. The Pope concluded his message wishing Haitians the best, as they are about to enter a new year, and urged them to build a better society. You can only do so, he warned, if there is true peace and justice. And, the message of Michel Azefort, Haiti's World Bank representative, to Haitians Wednesday, before returning to World Bank headquarters in Washington, D.C. permanently, reflected that of the Pope.

- The Haitian children's plight ... they are dying in great numbers --- "Haitian children" are hardly the last words that spring to leftist Haitian President Rene Preval's mind when thinking about Haiti, if ever, as the UNICEF (United Nations Children's Fund) 2000 Report on the plight of children in Haiti suggests. So one can say the same thing about leftist, chief bandit, Preval's political godfather and so-called president-elect, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, too. Among the 187 countries listed in the report, Haiti ranks 33th, with an infant mortality rate of 129 children per thousand who expire before reaching their fifth birthday. In the neighboring Dominican Republic, however, 49 children per thousand die before reaching the age of 5. If in Cuba and the United Stated, only 8 children per thousand die before they reach their fifth birthday in Canada, however, it is even less. Only 6 Canadian children expire before they turn 5. The UNICEF 2000 Report attributed the high rate of infant mortality to Haiti's horrible social conditions, which are not limited to a total absence of basic health care services and a pronounced lack of nutrition. A recently published UN Report ranked Haiti as the third hungriest country in the world after Somalia and Afghanistan. UNICEF Haiti's representative, Rodney Phillips made some recommendations, but first cited a few major social problems in Haiti, to, hopefully, help improve the lives of children the world over. "More than 65% of Haitian children don't have access to psychomotrice activities," he said. He urged all governments and those responsible for development from around the world to invest in children. "In so doing, he added "sure will you reduce the rate of poverty, and prevent alienation, hate and despair from dominating the lives of citizens." Lastly, "The first three years of the life of a child is vital to a society if its members are to be in good health, be happy and productive," said Representative Phillips.

- Leftist Aristide and cohorts in trouble; Gilman, Helms and Goss say no dictatorship, no drug trafficking, in Haiti

US HOUSE INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS COMMITTEE PRESS RELEASE DATE: December 8, 2000 FOR RELEASE: Immediate GILMAN, HELMS AND GOSS ISSUE STATEMENT ON HAITIAN ELECTION Washington (Dec. 8) -- U.S. Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman (20th-NY), Chairman of the House International Relations Committee, issued the following statement today along with Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms (R-NC) and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss (R-FL): November 26 marked a tragic day in Haiti's long and troubled quest for pluralism and representative democracy. Haitian President Rene Preval and his one-party electoral commission organized a sham election with the sole purpose of delivering absolute control over Haiti's government to Mr. Jean-Bertrand Aristide. News accounts put Haitian voter participation on November 26th at less than 10%. It was probably worse. Indeed, Aristide's rival candidates abandoned their campaigns when they concluded that the election was a farce. On this basis, Mr. Aristide cannot claim a popular mandate to give his anti-democratic actions the facade of legitimacy. There has clearly been an interruption in the democratic process in Haiti that demands the attention of the Organization of American States. The United States must also make it clear that Jean-Bertrand Aristide is not fit to joint the democratically elected leaders at the Summit of Americas in April 2001. Under Mr. Aristide's leadership and influence, Haiti has become even more impoverished. Haiti's incompetent and corrupt government turns a blind eye to the desperate plight of its people. Colombian narcotics traffickers have established a firm beachhead and, with their Haitian confederates, have largely succeeded in consolidating a narco-state in Haiti. Mr. Aristide's rare conciliatory rhetoric toward the opposition and the international community have never been met by commensurate actions. While he tells reporters that "the opposition is indispensable," leaders of the opposition have, in fact, gone into hiding from gangs of thugs acting in Mr. Aristide's name. Senior administration officials now concede that their policy toward Haiti has failed. A comprehensive, bottom-up review of U.S. policy toward Haiti is long overdue. Such an inter-agency review should evaluate U.S. efforts to combat drugs and money laundering and illegal migration - with particular emphasis on the implications of the Clinton Administration's failure to secure the renewal of a repatriation agreement with the Haitian government. The United States must now deal with Haiti for what it has become. Basic humanitarian assistance provided directly to the Haitian people and assistance to democratic elements in Haiti are the only forms of aid that should continue. All direct support for the Haitian Government must end, as provided under current U.S. law. We must protect Haitians who might be tempted to risk their lives on the high seas by vigorously enforcing our immigration laws.

Narco-traffickers, criminals and other anti-democratic elements who surround Jean-Bertrand Aristide should feel the full weight of U.S. law enforcement. Their U.S. visas must be denied or stripped from them, their green card status reviewed to ensure compliance with the requirements of that status, and their ill-gotten assets frozen.

- Sharpton, Louima, Cochran and heavy-weight hip-hop stars at Harvard --- The Criminal Justice Institute of Harvard Law School, which focuses on "Race, Police and Community relations" had something to be proud of Friday night. More than 500 people, including 30 police officers or so who traveled as far away as New York, convened at Harvard's Austin Hall for a conference on racial profiling sponsored by the Institute. About 100 of the participants could only watch the high profile conference on television monitors downstairs because the large conference hall, situated on the second floor, could not accommodate them all. Panels included: the impact of police brutality on victims, families and the communities, perils of racism for officers of color, litigation solutions and police leadership. Notable speakers included: Abner Louima, a Haitian immigrant who was assaulted with a plunger by four New York City police officers in August 1997 and the Rev. Al Sharpton, a New York City-based prominent national civil rights leader. So did several heavy-weight hip-hop stars center their discussions on issues affecting the hip-hop community, including hip-hop profiling. The Friday night event was