An interesting piece from a few days back. Argentines are supposed to be sending 600 troops to Haiti as part of the multilateral occupation/coup protection force. Some Argentines, like the Chileans I blogged about earlier, are displeased with the idea. An EFE story from June 25 describes it (I’ve pasted it below).
In other Haiti news, a delegation of the coup makers of Group 184, including sweatshop owner Andre Apaid, is making the rounds in Miami, and according to the Miami Herald, getting an underwhelming response with their ‘social contract’ that will overcome the deep class divisions and polarization in Haiti (by killing all the activists and thus convincing the poor that starving and lacking water is their inevitable fate — the best way to combat polarization and division). One Haitian in Florida said it quite eloquently: ”We are talking about a small group of families that have run Haiti and today they are talking about a new social contract? With whom and for what?”
I got an interesting story from the mainstream media via Dru Jay of the Dominion. A profile of a Canadian sniper who ‘worked’ in Haiti, the story quotes Master Corporal Scott Richardson saying: “It’s a lot of fun. Miserable and fun,” he said. “We’re the cool guys. We’re the ones who fly around in the helicopters, drop into the
mountains looking for the baddies … It’s a cool job.”
Good to know everyone from the public to the military is treating this murderous slaughter with the seriousness it deserves.
Meanwhile, as Justin Felux reports, the coup continues its filthy work, with the arrest of Haiti’s deposed Prime Minister Yvon Neptune.
Below, the story on the Argentine demonstration.
June 25, 2004
Argentines burn U.S. flag to protest sending troops to Haiti
EFE NEWS SERVICE: Leftist activists on Thursday set fire to the flags of the United States and the United Nations on the terrace of the Argentine Defense Ministry here as a protest against the deployment of troops to Haiti.
The demonstrators burned tires and threw firecrackers at the door of the building, which also houses Argentine army headquarters.
“If an army is national, it can’t be an invading army,” said Fernando Esteche, leader of the leftist organization Quebracho, at the protest, which was otherwise peaceful.
Some 600 Argentine troops are set to travel to Haiti in mid-July to join the U.N. peacekeeping mission on the Caribbean island.
Argentina plans to send a transport ship, two helicopters and health care units, including a mobile hospital, according to a decree published on Tuesday.
The Argentine troops, which will join those sent by Brazil, Chile and Uruguay, are slated to be stationed in the Haitian cities of Gonaives and Saint-Marc.
Last week, Argentine lawmakers passed a resolution deploying the contingent to support “the constitutional process” in Haiti and contribute to “a peaceful and lasting solution to the current crisis.”
The measure passed by a close margin, after the governing Justicialista (Peronist) Party used its majority in the legislature to overcome the opposition Radical Civic Union and leftist parties. .end (paragraph)
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