HAITI IN CONTEXT 2

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Aristide: U.S. troops forced him to leave Haiti

When asked if he left Haiti on his own, Aristide quickly answered: "No. I was forced to leave.

"Agents were telling me that if I don't leave they would start shooting and killing in a matter of time," Aristide said during the brief interview via speaker phone. He spoke with a thick Haitian accent and was interrupted at times by static.

When asked who the agents were, he responded: "White American, white military.

"They came at night. ... There were too many, I couldn't count them," he added.

Aristide told reporters that he signed documents relinquishing power out of fear that violence would erupt in Haiti if he didn't comply with the demands of "American security agents."

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If true, this is a straight-up US military intervention, yet another forced "regime change," yet another heavy-handed American occidental adventure. Furthermore, it would qualify as yet another Bush administration outrageous lie. There's good reason to believe Aristide's accusations: foreign policy figures within Bush's State Department have wanted him out for years.

From New York Newsday via Eshaton:

U.S. political maneuvering behind the ouster

The departure of Haiti's Jean-Bertrand Aristide is a victory for a Bush administration hard-liner who has been long dedicated to Aristide's ouster, U.S. foreign policy analysts say.

That official is Roger Noriega, assistant U.S. secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, whose influence over U.S. policy toward Haiti has increased during the past decade as he climbed the diplomatic ladder in Washington.

"Roger Noriega has been dedicated to ousting Aristide for many, many years, and now he's in a singularly powerful position to accomplish it," Robert White, a former U.S. ambassador to El Salvador and Paraguay, said last week.

God, these neo-conservative Machiavellians are crawling all over the place!

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