World Responds to the Earthquake in Haiti
January 15, 2010 - 8:32pm
The new thread on relief to Haiti
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Syndicate
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=116102§ionid=351020706
Latin American nations have scrambled to deployed rescue workers, doctors and supplies to the earthquake-hit island of Haiti.
Rescue efforts stepped up as Haiti's prime minister warned the death toll may top 100,000 from Tuesday's brutal 7.0-magnitude earthquake that flattened much of the capital, Port-au-Prince.
Neighboring Cuba where also felt the quake and evacuated some 30,000 people following a brief tsunami alert, sent 30 doctors on Wednesday, according to Cuban media.
Some 400 Cuban medical staff already in Haiti were largely unharmed and two Cuban field hospitals in the capital, Port-au-Prince, had dealt with almost 700 wounded by early Wednesday, said Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez.
Brazil said it was sending 10 million dollars in immediate disaster aid, including 28 tons of drinking water and food.
Peru will send two planes with 50 metric tons of humanitarian aid, mainly food, and 18 doctors and nurses and two field hospitals, the health minister said Wednesday afternoon, adding that Peruvian President Alan Garcia may accompany the mission.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez promised more aid after the departure of a first group of 50 doctors, firefighters and rescue workers from Venezuela early Wednesday.
http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/World/Story/STIStory_478159.htm...
The 82nd Airborne troops set up base at the airport, securing the entrance to the terminal where they began filtering US passport holders out of the crowd of hundreds of frustrated would-be refugees demanding flights.
A measure of order was restored, but there were confused and sometimes angry scenes as non-American diplomats tried to extract their own nationals from the crowd to usher them to rescue planes waiting on the tarmac.
In the field of healthcare and other areas, Cuba – despite being a poor and blockaded country – has been cooperating with the Haitian people for many years. Around 400 doctors and healthcare experts are offering their services free of charge to the Haitian people. Our doctors are working every day in 227 of the country’s 337 communes. On the other hand, at least 400 young Haitians have trained as doctors in our homeland. They will now work with the reinforcement brigade which traveled there yesterday to save lives in this critical situation. Thus, without any special effort being made, up to 1,000 doctors and healthcare experts can be mobilized, almost all of whom are already there willing to cooperate with any other state that wishes to save the lives of the Haitian people and rehabilitate the injured.
Another significant number of young Haitians are currently studying medicine in Cuba.
Fidel, the other one
Counterpunch
http://www.trinicenter.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2109
There are only two US media outlets that have reported on Cuba’s response to the deadly 7.0 earthquake that hit Haiti. One was Fox News, which claimed, wrongly, that the Cubans were absent from the list of neighboring Caribbean countries providing aid.
...
The American emergency response, predictably, has focussed primarily, at least in terms of personnel and money, on sending the hugely costly and inefficient US military--a fleet of aircraft and an aircraft carrier--a factor that should be considered when examining that $100 million figure the Obama administration claims is being allocated to emergency aid to Haiti. Considering that the cost of operating an aircraft carrier, including crew, is roughly $2 million a day, just sending a carrier to Port-au-Prince for two weeks accounts for a quarter of the announced American aid effort, and while many of the military personnel sent there will certainly be doing actual aid work, delivering supplies and guarding supplies, many, given America’s long history of brutal military/colonial control of Haiti, will inevitably be spending their time ensuring continued survival and control of the parasitic pro-US political elite in Haiti.
Otherwise, the US has basically ignored the ongoing day-to-day human crisis in Haiti, while Cuba has been doing the yeoman work of providing basic health care.
But that’s not a story that the American corporate media want to tell.
http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news/5067
Venezuela sent its first aid airplane to Haiti, a Bolivarian National Armed Force's Hercules C-130, with a fifty-strong advance humanitarian aid team on board, on Wednesday morning, after a 7.3 magnitude earthquake leveled the country’s capital Port-au-Prince, late Tuesday.
...
Aid is also beginning to flow from other countries, with Latin American countries being among the first to react. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega sent a team of electricians to help with the repair of power lines as much of the country’s electricity and telecommunications systems were destroyed in the quake. Cuba is sending medical supplies and doctors, while Mexico is sending a team of doctors and rescue workers.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon released $10 million from the UN’s emergency relief fund to assist aid efforts and called for member countries to do likewise.
Spain has pledged $4.3 million (3 million Euros) and 150 tonnes of humanitarian aid. France is also sending aid and rescue workers. Germany has pledged $2.18 million (1.5 million Euros), the Netherlands $2.9 million (2 million Euros) and Belgium, Sweden and Luxembourg are offering water purification equipment, tents, medical help, and search-and-rescue teams. The United States said it would send a team of 61 rescue workers.
When countries are knocked flat by war and disaster, it's the middle class that helps to pull them to their feet.
But in Haiti, where 80 per cent of the people are below the poverty line, most of the budget comes from international organizations and foreign aid agencies deliver the majority of basic social services, the tiny middle class has a far larger role to play.
This week's devastating earthquake has put that, and Haiti's future as a functioning country, in doubt.
"There's been huge emigration from Haiti, which made it less viable and less governable," says James Morrell, director of the Washington-based Haiti Democracy Project. "Some of the educated people are still there, and they are capable of making plans and running systems. But this can only make things worse."
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/haiti/article/751030--who-will-be-left-to-rebuild-country
You can find a list of countries that are contributing here. It's not up to date and is missing a few major players. Israel has sent a sizeable delegation and Turkey together with the Turkish Red Crescent has made a major contribution. I'm sure there are others that I don't know about.
Another personalized update
Lamp for Haiti has a project in Cite Soleil which is a medical and legal clinic. They also have school projects. We still have no word from our school project in Cite Soleil and so the volunteers from Lamp for Haiti are going to send us updates from Soleil and see if they can get info for us. This is an update from their organization. I met Dr. Jim Morgan, one of the medical clinic support doctors from New Jersey, last May when I was in Haiti. We shared several great conversations over a glass of good Canadian whiskey that I had bought at the Caribbean Market. (The market, an upscale supermarket in Petionville, is no longer standing.) Their clinic is built in a district called Bwa Nef in Cite Soleil and actually on the site of a former gang headquarters. Dr. Morgan is presently in the Dominican Republic waiting to travel to Haiti. The Dominican Republic is the alternative entry point since the bottleneck at the airport in Port au Prince is making entry very difficult. He will try and get to their clinic later today, Sunday. The clinic manager in Cite Soleil has reported that there is no water, food or any sign of emergency assistance in Cite Soleil. The security situation has dramatically deteriorated in the area.
Dr. Morgan is currently in the Dominican Republic waiting to travel to Haiti. Once I get his updates from Cite Soleil I will pass them along here. They spoke to their clinic manager yesterday at 5:30pm. She reported that there was no water, food or any sign of emergency assistance in cite Soleil. She also said that the security situation has dramatically deteriorated. The staff physician Dr. J. Benoit Prosper, Clinic Manager Myrlene "Mimi" Dominique and Nurse Ms. Flor survived the quake uninjured. Nurse Astrude Tabois has a badly injured ankle. Another colleague has remained out of contact and there is no word on his status.
Their clinic is still standing with the main buildings intact but damaged. This was one of the only free clinics in all of Cite Soleil, an area that houses almost a quarter of a million people. The surrounding fields are most likely filled with injured people with no other place to turn to. When Dr. Morgan arrives he will be one of the first non-military humanitarian assistance allowed to enter the country. The Ports are not operational making non-military shipping almost impossible at this point.
It is my personal hope that one of my updates will soon have some good news of our school project, friends and colleagues in Cite Soleil. There is now a new danger for them even if they have survived. Disease, lack of water, food, and despair as they see relief efforts elsewhere but none so far for them.
While people are posting ways to help please keep our group in mind. www.twawareness.org I will be traveling this May 2010 as scheduled to Haiti (our regular trip schedule) with the group in order to start whatever rebuilding is needed. Our philosophy is to go and ask first what the community needs. They organize and control the projects. We invest the funds and whatever other help is needed. We simply get more done that way. If the school is no longer standing it may very well not be a priority in May but they were designing it to be a community hub as well as a school. We were about to finish the next stage which was a second story. This second story would also be used for a high school. One of the first ones in Cite Soleil.
344 Cuban Medics Treat Earthquake Victims
Cuban doctors are working in all 10 "departments" (administrative regions) of Haiti. They are assisted by approximately 400 Haitian medical interns who have completed medical degrees on full scholarships in Cuba.
Cuba has provided free public health care to the poor of Haiti since 1989 - the only public medicine available in that country. During the recent coup and subsequent US/French/Canadian invasion which deposed the Aristide presidency, Cuban doctors continued to provide medical care when other hospitals closed down and other doctors fled the country.
Cuban doctors will go where no doctor has gone before, live in conditions that no doctor has ever lived in before and deliver life saving medical care to people who have never even seen a doctor before. And they do all this for free. Each doctor feels privileged to be able to use their skills to help people who are in such desperate need of medical care. 35,000 Cuban medics currently provide healthcare in 78 countries around the world, more than the World Health Organisation and Medecins sans Frontiers put together.
Cuban doctors have unique experience of working in earthquake zones in third world countries without infrastructure. There are Cuban medics currently working on the frozen slopes of the Himalayas in Pakistan following their unmatched medical support provided during the 2005 Pakistan earthquake. Many hiked for days over mudslides to reach the isolated communities of the region to deliver medical assistance. To this day, Pakistanis parents in the earthquake region name their children after the Cuban doctors who helped deliver them.
Unfortunately, we respond better to singular victims than we do to mass suffering. I'd also suggest that we respond better to new situations of suffering than those that have gone on a long time.
Our empathic telescopes are activated when we hear a single cry for help -- the child drowning in the pond, the dog abandoned on an ocean. When we think of human suffering on a mass scale, our telescope does not work, because it has not been designed to work in such situations. Humans are the only species that is even aware of large-scale suffering taking place in distant lands; the moral telescope in our brain has not had a chance to evolve and catch up with our technological advances. Our conscious minds can tell us that it is absurd to spend a boatload of money to save one life when the same money could be used to save 10. But in moral decision-making, as in many other domains of life where we are unaware of how unconscious biases influence us, it is the hidden brain that usually carries the day.
On the other hand, some people just don't care at all.
The Angry Black Woman on US media coverage of the disaster in Haiti, racism, and colonial history. The article contains many excellent links / references to the world's contributors to aid to Haiti.
Why is American tv coverage of the Haitian disaster driving me to drink?
posted by unusualmusic at TheAngryBlackWoman.com
Chris Matthews is on my tv carefully saying how much Haiti's problems are due to its politics. He is also congratulating the US on how much its image will be burnished because of how quickly it is responding to the crisis. Really. Yes, really. And aren't we the greatest country in the world?
And most of the reporters that are on my tv are emphasizing how poor and desperate Haiti's people were before the quake. And how sad isn't it, that this country has never been able to get its act together oh my! But don't worry, America's there to save them now. And aren't we the greatest country in the world? And not ONE of the assholes has mentioned that the United States and the French were and are a main cause of the poverty, and dictatorship and blood shed.
Scroll down, and down, to see the lists of countries who are contributing aid, food and water to Haiti.
Go Home US Military
http://www.creative-i.info/2010/01/18/go-home-us-military-haiti-doesnt-n...
"The US is not hiding its imperialism behind the UN anymore. Its come out into the light. Right now you need State Department clearance to land in Haiti.
The issue is not emergency rescue anymore. Emergency is immediate, it's within 48 hours. That's over. The people who could have been saved under the rubble and metal have mostly died.
International assistance has never helped Haiti's pain and it's not helping the bulk of the earthquake survivors right now - mostly the more privileged classes as per usual.."
Caricom Blocked as US Takes Control
http://www.creative-i.info/2010/01/18/caricom-blocked-as-us-takes-contro...
"The Caribbean Community's emergency aid mission to Haiti, comprising Heads of Government and leading technical officials, failed to secure permission Friday to land at that devastated country's airport, now under the control of the US.
On Friday the US State Department confirmed signing two 'Memoranda of Understanding' with the Government of Haiti that made official that 'the United States is in charge of all inbound and outbound flights and aid offloading.."
Hey it's Monday I'm going to paint a big bullseye on my chest (=
They are occupying Haiti undercover, he said."
From the previous thread- of course!
The west is using this disaster to secretly move soldiers in to the country to occupy it. We will install a puppet government and then send the "local soldiers" to Iraq and add them to the coalition of the willing.
The military is ALSO the best "first responder" to crises like this...
The biggest concern in the wake of a disaster is security. Security for the locals. Security for the relief workers. Security for the supplies.
I hate to say it but in situations like this a darker side of humans come out. The survival of the fitest switch gets thrown and people can throw ethics and morals our the window.
We're seeing news stories of armed gangs fighting each other for food water etc..
Hate it as much as you want but the ability to provide security is a paramount.
Next is the ability to pick 1000 people up out of a community and them leave for 3 months. Military communities are designed for this. Those of us with children, how many of you can pack your bags and be out the door by Thursday? Who is going to watch your children? What if you're a single parent? Who is taking them to school?
One of the best resources in the wake of a disaster is manpower. [Not MAN-power but a large body of people].
Healthy physically fit motivated disciplined men and women who are trained to work in harsh living conditions.
Everyone keeps asking why is the aid taking so long to get handed out. That's a great question that needs to be screamed over and over. Sadly it's been asked before and will probably continue to be asked.
Here are some of the reasons I see why aid is so slow to be handed out.
Communication;
Having worked with other countries I can tell you that communication is simultaneously one of the most important things yet always lacking. In a perfect world everyone would work together but in reality we have constant communication break downs. From something as simple as language to companies that have different operating procedures.
Example.
Red cross and Red Crescent each have half a truck worth of supplies. Only one truck is available what do you do? Well just put them both on the truck and hand it out right? Not that easy.
The red crescent just wants to get this stuff handed out ASAP.
The red cross however cannot load everything onto the truck UNTIL everything is accounted for and recorded (Need to keep track of where donations go). Red Cross needs to wait until a supervisor comes to sign off everything before they can load it. So why not just let the red Crescent load their stuff up and get it sent out? Not that easy. The truck company is under strict orders to make sure every truck is full and they won't send out a half full truck. maybe they don't get paid as much.
That example sounds absolutely crazy doesn't it? Well I can tell you from experience this is the exact kind of problems that pop up. Little chicken shit stuff like this can have drastic repercussions.
Trust;
Not only do we have different companies from the same country working together but from other countries. Even when companies from the same country work together they don't trust each other to get the job done. Big tendency to micromanage. Add in another country and blammo. Time is wasted pissing around looking over each others shoulders.
Ego;
The military thinks they have all the answers. The NGOs think they know the best way to get the job done. Local organizations [Or groups that were there pre-disaster] think everyone should follow their lead. Time gets wasted figuring out who should be in charge who has the best approach who has the best plan who should do all the shit jobs.
Sometimes the reasons why shit isn't getting done is the weirdest unimaginable things. Someone forgot to load the yellow battery charger for the forklift and now the forklifts are just sitting around. Just get some people to handbalm the supplies off the planes. But the company that owns the plane only lets forklifts unload the planes they won't cover any medical expenses for people who may get hurt unloading their aircraft. More waiting while that gets sorted out.
So many stupid little unimaginable problems pop up and it's the little things that slow everything down.
Pet Peeve #274:
11 Canadians confirmed dead in Haiti
So, 200 000 Haitians or so will likely die because of Western influence--now apathy, now aggression--but we continue to focus on the handful of Canadians who also sadly perished. Why? So we can relate to the story? Because mass Haitian graves aren't empathetic enough?
11 confirmed dead 859 still missing.
Crushing Haiti, Now as Always
http://www.counterpunch.org/patrick01152010.html
"When a Haitian minister skims 15 percent of aid money it is called 'corruption' and when an NGO or Aid Agency takes 50%, it is called 'overhead'."
Haiti: Where America Never Learns:
http://www.counterpunch.org/reeves01152010.html
"The only alternative to America's unlearned lessons on Haiti, is for international Haiti solidarity to revive and for the UN Peacekeepers to get off the back of Lavalas activists, and allow the reinvigoration of that revolutionary movement.."
Frustration Mounts Over Haiti Aid:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/01/201011831019984373.ht...
"People could see helicopters flying overhead, US military vehicles in the city and aeroplanes arriving at the airport with supplies, so it was difficult to understand why little aid appeared to be reaching the people.."
US Denies 'Haiti Occupation'
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/01/201011853210304808.ht...
"a spokesman for the US State Department rejected suggestions that US military needs were taking priority over the needs of quake survivors. 'The democratically elected government of Haiti is in charge,' he said.
His comments followed criticism from foreign governments and aid groups that the US has prioritised military needs instead of humanitarian ones after taking over operations at the Haitian capital's airport.."
Haiti: MSF cargo plane with full hospital and staff blocked from landing in Port-au-Princehttp://www.msf.ca/news-media/news/2010/01/haiti-msf-cargo-plane-with-ful...
'A Lootin an A Burnin': Media Disinformation on Haiti
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17044
"Thus far..the rescue teams cluster at the high profile and safer walled sites and were literally afraid to enter the barrios. They gravitated to the sites where they had secure compounds and big buildings. Meanwhile in the poor neighbourhoods, awash in rubble, there was not a foreigner in sight.."
War Criminals Peddle 'Humanitarian' Aid to Haiti
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17041
"On Sunday, Bill Clinton and George W Bush mounted the corporate media platform and complained about the politicization of the Haitian relief effort.."
What Bush did to Haiti
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17036
"The February 29, 2004 Coup D'etat instigated by the Bush administration"
Canadian Forces Head to Port Town of Jacmel:
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/01/18/haiti-jacmel-canada.html
"Canada's disaster response team in Haiti will focus its aid efforts on the port town of Jacmel, Brig. Gen. Guy Laroche says. Laroche said he travelled with Haitian Prime Minister Jean Max Bellerive to see the damage in the town of 40,000 - a popular tourist destination.."
BBC - Haiti: Aid Workers Diaries
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8458915.stm
"I spoke to a surgeon yesterday, and he was so frustrated and stressed about the fact that five patients he saw yesterday needed immediate surgery. But he can't save their lives because they don't have a proper operational theatre. We need more space to perform surgeries, which the inflatable hospital will provide - if it ever comes!
So it's getting worse because the patients who were not critical only 3 days ago, are now in critical phases. This means people will die from preventable infections.
It's horrible, it's really so terrible that people are begging for help and we can't help them..."
More Troops, Aid for Haiti - But Pace Decried:
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/haiti/article/752148--more-troops-aid-...
"But help was still not reaching many victims of Tuesday's quake - choked back by transportation bottlenecks, bureaucratic confusion, fear of attacks on aid convoys, the collapse of local authority and the sheer scale of the need.
'We don't need military aid. What we need is food and shelter,' one young man yelled at UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon during his visit to the city Sunday.
'We are dying,' one woman told him.
Haitian riot police meanwhile fired tear gas to disperse crowds of looters in the city's downtown..."
US Military Tightens Grip on Haiti
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/jan2010/hait-j18.shtml
"Amid the humanitarian tragedy following the January 12 earthquake in Haiti, Washington has concentrated on establishing indefinite military control of the country. Fearing mass protests and riots by desperate Haitians against inadequate rescue efforts, US logistical efforts are focused on massing tens of thousands of troops for use against the population.
The US military intervention in Haiti is criminal in both form and content.
Disguised as a humanitarian rescue operation, its main aim is to build up the necessary firepower to terrorize the masses into accepting a shocking lack of treatment without protest.."
Bush, Clinton and the Crimes of Imperialism
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/jan2010/pers-j18.shtml
"Bush and Clinton personify the pernicious and reactionary role that American imperialism has played in Haiti for the last century.
It is no exaggeration to say that the policies of their administrations have caused as much death and devastation in that country as last Tuesday's earthquake.."
The US military intervention in Haiti is criminal in both form and content.
LOL
The US caused this earth quake just so they can come in and harvest bodies to use for their zombie army which they will send to Iraq. It's true. Haiti would be much better off with out the US military "helping" them.
Soldiers out of Haiti!
All Hail the Benevolent Empire
Oh Hillary!!! Your presence lifts the spirits of the people.
The Haitians are now praying that Obama himself will come to share in their grief.
The quake killed maybe 100,000 people, but every year over 200,000 children die in Haiti from starvation and disease. There is a real holocaust going on in Haiti every bit as bad as what was done by the Nazis to the Jews. The ultimate goal is the eradication of all people from haiti and the land turned over to Club Med so that a new Dom Rep can be created.
http://www.counterpunch.org/patrick01152010.html
"When a Haitian minister skims 15 percent of aid money it is called 'corruption' and when an NGO or Aid Agency takes 50%, it is called 'overhead'."
Strange how the author is unable to actually identify any NGO's that are skimming 50% off of donations for overhead . . . or even say much about Haiti at all for that matter, seeing how much of the article is a weird tangent about Iraq and Afghanistan.
[citation needed]
There is no food, water or medicine for the 84 surviving residents of the Port-au-Prince Municipal Nursing Home, barely a mile (1 1/2 kilometers) from the airport where a massive international aid effort is taking shape.
God bless the marines
However, another MSF cargo plane carrying vital medical supplies to replenish stocks for Choscal hospital, where an MSF team is working on a backlog of patients needing surgery, was not allowed to land in Port-au-Prince on Sunday, January 17, and was forced to re-route to the Dominican Republic, where it landed. Choscal hospital will run out of medical supplies in less than 24 hours and its cold chain system for preserving medicines and vaccines at the proper temperatures could be compromised if this cargo plane is not able to fly into Port-au-Prince immediately.
We're in the Army now
THE CARIBBEAN Community’s emergency aid mission to Haiti, comprising Heads of Government and leading technical officials, failed to secure permission Friday to land at that devasted country’s aiport, now under the control of the United States.
Consequently, the Caricom ’assessment mission’, that was to determine priority humanitarian needs resulting from the mind-boggling earthquake disaster of Haiti last Tuesday, had to travel back from Jamaica to their respective home destinations..
On Friday afternoon the US State Department confirmed signing two ’Memoranda of Understanding’ with the Government of Haiti that made ’official that the United Stateas is in charge of all inbound and outbound flights and aid off-loading...’
If they don't do as they're told, light 'em up
"The government is a joke. The UN is a joke," Jacqueline Thermiti, 71, said as she lay in the dust with dozens of dying elderly outside their destroyed nursing home. "We're a kilometre from the airport and we're going to die of hunger."
http://www.cp24.com/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20100117/100117_haiti?hub=C...
US immigration officials had been refusing to allow children into the country until next weekend. However, as Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State, arrived to assure Haitians that America stood ready to help “in any way we can”.
Where "anything we can" is the aid equivalent to "yes we can".
Does Haiti have the capacity for managing this now? Someone has to. It might be the case that they don't have functioning air traffic control anymore. It would be nice if there were someone independent who could take this over but there isn't. Will the Americans take undue advantage? Hell yes, they always do.
"All the nation is feeling this earthquake -- the poor, the middle class and the richest ones," said Erwin Berthold, owner of the Big Star Market in Petionville. "But we did okay here. We have everything cleaned up inside. We are ready to open. We just need some security. So send in the Marines, okay?"
As Berthold stood outside his two-story market, stocked with fine wines and imported food from Miami and Paris, his customers cruised by and asked when he would reopen. "Maybe Monday!" he shouted, then held up his hand to his ear, for customers to call his cellphone.
Now we know who asked for the marines.
Fractured Narrative - Haitian Calm - American Cynicism
http://www.chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/1-latest-news/1903-fractured-narrative-haitian-calm-american-cynicism.html
"One can almost feel the disappointment amongst Western media mavens that earthquake stricken Haitians have not, in fact, degenerated into packs of feral animals tearing each other to pieces...the prophesied riots never seem to materialize. The media have sought strenuously to revive the bogus narrative that they foisted on the destruction of New Orleans 'Black Folks Gone Wild'. But thus far they have been palpably disappointed..."
Haiti: An Unwelcome Katrina Redux - by Cynthia McKinney
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17063
"We note here the writings of Ms Marguerite Laurent, whom I met in her capacity as attorney for ousted President of Haiti Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Ms Laurent reminds us of Haiti's offshore oil and other mineral riches and recent revival of an old idea to use Haiti as an oil refinery - to be built there as a trans-shipment terminal for US supertankers.
Ezili's HLLN underlines these 2 papers on Haiti's oil resources and the fowrk of DiGinette and Daniel Mathurin in order to provide a view one will not find in the mainstream media nor anywhere else as to the economic and strategic resources.
The US has constructed its 5th largest embassy in the world - 5th only besides the US embassy in China, Iraq, Iran and Germany.
In tiny Haiti..."
'Haiti est une lumiere' - Victor Hugo
Disaster Capitalism is Heading for Haiti - by Stephen Lendman
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/01/disaster-capitalism-headed-to-hait...
"It's disaster capitalism, business is booming, and Haitians will soon feel its full fury under military occupation.."
As bodies burn, Haitians pray, cry for help, angry at world's response
They also sounded furious with President Rene Preval, who hasn't been seen at a rescue site or gone on radio to address the nation since the quake struck.
"Preval out! Aristide come back!" some shouted, appealing for a return of the populist Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was ousted in 2004. From his South African exile, Aristide said last week he wants to return to Haiti, but spoke of no concrete plans to do so.
France Criticizes US 'Occupation' of Haiti
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=116503§ionid=351020706
"France is demanding the United Nations investigate and clarify the dominant US role in Haiti, after Washington deployed over 10,000 troops to the quake hit country.
The demand came after US Forces turned back a French aid plane carrying a field hospital from the main airport.
'This is about helping Haiti not about occupying Haiti' France's Cooperation Minister Alain Joyandet said in an emergency EU meeting concerning Haiti on Monday.."
Haitian's Desperate Wait for Food, Water - Tensions Mounting as Logjam Stalls Delivery of UN Relief Shipments
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/752527--haitians-desperate-wai...
Port-Au-Prince "They are telling the hungry here that food is on the way but the promises are proving as empty as Haitian stomachs.
Every day, the United Nations says tens of thousands of pounds of food lands in this city,
but it is nowhere to be found in the streets of Port au Prince..."
CBC - Aid to Haiti Increases Amid Desperation
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/01/18/haiti-earthquake.html
"About 7,000 military peacekeepers and 2,100 international police are in Haiti. Ban said Monday he asked the UN Security Council to add 2,000 troops and 1,500 police..
About 180 tonnes of relief supplies arrived Sunday, but scores of people on the street say none of it is reaching them...
Bottlenecks at the capital's airport and the damaged harbour have made it logistically difficult to distribute supplies...
Geneva based Doctors without Borders said: 'There is little sign of significant aid distribution.'..
The Exodus from Port au Prince and the Aid that Does Not Come (and vid)
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/thefield/3742/haiti-report-telesurs-ree...
"unique ground level view of post-earthquake Port au Prince"
Disease Fears in Quake Hit Haiti
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/01/201011925913148759.ht...
"Doctors working in the capital Port au Prince also said that many children, the weak and elderly are at risk of dying unnecessarily from diarrheal disease that could easily be treated with water and rehydration salts...
Jacques Lorblancher, a surgeon sent by the humanitarian group Doctors of the World told AFP news agency that he lost count of the number of amputations performed in the last 48 hours in Haiti..
I have never seen anything like this - infected wounds full of larvae he said. I did my first amputation with 3 forceps, scissors and a scalpel, without water and just a flashlight to illuminate the injury..There is gangrene everywhere and you amputate on the go.."
Haiti Quake - Aid Workers Diaries - BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8466633.stm
"none of the agencies are distributing medical supplies to the north of Haiti and this is now urgent..
we can cope provided we get the aid that everyone thinks they have given directed here now..
there has to be aid supplies right across Haiti. There were never any reserves in the hospitals before the earthquake.
And there is nothing now..."
Haiti: Reports of Violence, fears of 'Undercover Occupation'
http://www.ww4report.com/node/8221
'the US is concentrating on getting military boots on the ground first. Accusing Washington of 'disaster imperialism' she charges the media with hyping reports of violence. An anonymous report from a Canadian in Haiti with the Canada Haiti Action network of a stark class/race disparity in responding to the injured. The aid workers say rescue teams are refusing to go into popular neighbourhoods because they fear 'violence'.."
This is another update from Lamp for Haiti which runs a medical and legal clinic in Cite Soleil. Soleil still does not have coordinated international assistance.
Lamp Medical Director Dr. James Morgan has arrived in Port-Au-Prince and is seeing patients. He is safe, but communications are still limited, so our information is sporadic. We do know that the Lamp Clinic is still standing and will soon provide a location where emergency medical teams can stage to provide care in Cite Soleil, an area not yet served by large international aid efforts.
Humanitarian interventions must integrate human rights dimensions in order to ensure the most appropriate response to victims, before, during and after this disaster. To that end, Lamp Legal Director Thomas M. Griffin, Esq. will travel to Haiti on Saturday January 23. Like Dr. Morgan, Tom will take much needed medial and survival supplies. However, the awareness of human rights and the implementation of rights-based approaches in disaster management are still insufficient and must also be immediately addressed. The poorest and most vulnerable of Haiti must be targeted for priority assistance and empowerment.
The Rescue Operation's Priorities in Haiti
http://www.counterpunch.org/valdes01182010.html
"The facts indicate clear priorities: the Haitians are not first in line. Seemingly the outsiders coming to help the people don't trust the natives, despite the fact that the Haitians are dying, hungry, thirsty, sick, homeless and with most of their families gone or lost..
Meanwhile the twice elected and twice removed political leader of the Haitians, Jean Bertrand Aristide, is not permitted to enter his own country. In fact, President Obama appointed one of those who ousted him - George W Bush to help 'supervise' the 'reconstruction of Haiti..
Meanwhile, for all intent and purposes there is no longer, except symbolically, a Haitian government.."
Security concerns cause doctors to leave hospital, quake victims
The decision left CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Sanjay Gupta as the only doctor at the hospital to get the patients through the night.
CNN initially reported, based on conversations with some of the doctors, that the United Nations ordered the Belgian First Aid and Support Team to evacuate. However, Belgian Chief Coordinator Geert Gijs, a doctor who was at the hospital with 60 Belgian medical personnel, said it was his decision to pull the team out for the night. Gijs said he requested U.N. security personnel to staff the hospital overnight, but was told that peacekeepers would only be able to evacuate the team.
He said it was a "tough decision" but that he accepted the U.N. offer to evacuate after a Canadian medical team, also at the hospital with Canadian security officers, left the site Friday afternoon. The Belgian team returned Saturday morning.
It looks like Gupta is much more useful with CNN - good thing he turned down the Obama job:
Gupta -- assisted by other CNN staffers, security personnel and at least one Haitian nurse who refused to leave -- assessed the needs of the 25 patients, but there was little they could do without supplies.
More people, some in critical condition, were trickling in late Friday.
"I've never been in a situation like this. This is quite ridiculous," Gupta said.
With a dearth of medical facilities in Haiti's capital, ambulances had nowhere else to take patients, some of whom had suffered severe trauma -- amputations and head injuries -- under the rubble. Others had suffered a great deal of blood loss, but there were no blood supplies left at the clinic.
Gupta feared that some would not survive the night.
He and the others stayed with the injured all night, after the medical team had left and after the generators gave out and the tents turned pitch black.
Gupta monitored patients' vital signs, administered painkillers and continued intravenous drips. He stabilized three new patients in critical condition.
At 3:45 a.m., he posted a message on Twitter: "pulling all nighter at haiti field hosp. lots of work, but all patients stable. turned my crew into a crack med team tonight."
I See No Evidence Of A Government Presence Here
http://www.counterpunch.org/morse01182010.html
"If the UN can't go where the The People need their help then what are they doing here?
If the UN can't gain the trust of the Haitians after 4 years then what are they doing here? Carrefour Feuille is a zone of destruction.
The fact I haven't seen an international presence in this case tells me that others are following the lead of the UN
I don't know what the details of the rescue efforts are.
I don't know how long someone can survive buried in the rubble."
More Than Aid, Haiti Needs Allies
http://www.counterpunch.org/tolu01182010.html
"Haiti has suffered enough - from the bellicosity of its affluent neighbors. And as if to punish Haitians further, mainstream media has made a circus of the crisis.
Only a courageous countervailing movement that stands strong for the dignities and humanities of Haitians - during the aftermath and beyond, when TV channels have moved on to the next circus.."
Witness To A Nightmare
http://socialistworker.org/2010/01/18/witness-to-a-nightmare
"One of the things that you also notice when you go through the streets is that everyone's out there on their own. There was very little of the government or the UN in the efforts to find these bodies or help the injured. During our drive we only saw the UN in front of the place where their headquarters used to be.
If the UN mission here was really about helping the people of Haita, this would be the best place in the world to have an earthquake--not that you'd want one anywhere, but you'd have a huge peackeeping force that could help with the injured and rebuild the country.
But instead, in the course of a day or two, so many people died needlessly because they didn't get a bandage on their head wound.
I just read that the new estimate by local officials is 200,000 dead. I had originally read 50,000. If people who are still trapped don't get water, this number is actually conceivable."
Cruise Ship Docks at Private Beach for BBQ and Water Sports
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/01/18/cruise-ship-docks-at.html
"The Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines' ship Independence Of The Seas went ahead with its scheduled stop at a fenced in private Haitian beach surrounded by armed guards, leaving its passengers to 'cut loose' on the beach, just a few kilometers from one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the region's history.."
Gazans Raise Money for Haiti
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=255047
"We are here supporting the victims of Haiti..We feel for them the most because we were exposed to our own earthquake during Israel's war on Gaza.."
In repect to aid not reaching the Haitians because the USA is controlling the ports and airports and turning away MSF, thought there was something amiss in the news reporting last night, even though there was a huge about of other information being provided....
guess our news is even more controlled than, I at least, thought...
Also the hypocrisy of "rich" people is amazing:
The Florida cruise company leases a picturesque wooded peninsula and its five pristine beaches from the government for passengers to "cut loose" with watersports, barbecues, and shopping for trinkets at a craft market before returning on board before dusk. Safety is guaranteed by armed guards at the gate.
The decision to go ahead with the visit has divided passengers. The ships carry some food aid, and the cruise line has pledged to donate all proceeds from the visit to help stricken Haitians. But many passengers will stay aboard when they dock; one said he was "sickened".
"I just can't see myself sunning on the beach, playing in the water, eating a barbecue, and enjoying a cocktail while [in Port-au-Prince] there are tens of thousands of dead people being piled up on the streets, with the survivors stunned and looking for food and water," one passenger wrote on the Cruise Critic internet forum.
"It was hard enough to sit and eat a picnic lunch at Labadee before the quake, knowing how many Haitians were starving," said another. "I can't imagine having to choke down a burger there now.''
but the person stating that managed to take the same cruise again.....
Paris Club urges creditors to forgive Haiti's debt
Paris Club members agreed in July to cancel their claims on Haiti, totaling $214 million, though some countries have yet to finalize the process. The Paris Club is an informal group of creditor governments from industrialized countries, and those who were owed money by Haiti are Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Britain and the U.S.
The Paris Club "calls upon other bilateral creditors also to urgently provide full debt cancellation to Haiti," considering the financing needs the Caribbean country faces in rebuilding, it said in a statement.
Haiti's primary bilateral debt outside the Paris Club is $167 million owed to Venezuela and $91 million owed to Taiwan, according to the IMF.
Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou said Tuesday that Taiwan will consider canceling debts from earthquake-ravaged Haiti, a move that could add to Taipei's cachet in a region where rival China is making inroads.
No water yet, but hooray, the solar-powered bibles have made it!
In repect to aid not reaching the Haitians because the USA is controlling the ports and airports and turning away MSF, thought there was something amiss in the news reporting last night, even though there was a huge about of other information being provided....
guess our news is even more controlled than, I at least, thought...
Also the hypocrisy of "rich" people is amazing:
The Florida cruise company leases a picturesque wooded peninsula and its five pristine beaches from the government for passengers to "cut loose" with watersports, barbecues, and shopping for trinkets at a craft market before returning on board before dusk. Safety is guaranteed by armed guards at the gate.
The decision to go ahead with the visit has divided passengers. The ships carry some food aid, and the cruise line has pledged to donate all proceeds from the visit to help stricken Haitians. But many passengers will stay aboard when they dock; one said he was "sickened".
"I just can't see myself sunning on the beach, playing in the water, eating a barbecue, and enjoying a cocktail while [in Port-au-Prince] there are tens of thousands of dead people being piled up on the streets, with the survivors stunned and looking for food and water," one passenger wrote on the Cruise Critic internet forum.
"It was hard enough to sit and eat a picnic lunch at Labadee before the quake, knowing how many Haitians were starving," said another. "I can't imagine having to choke down a burger there now.''
but the person stating that managed to take the same cruise again.....
I think that is sickening as well. However, DR, Cuba, etc. are all extremely close as well. How many people are cancelling their plans to sun on those beaches nearby to donate the money to Haiti?
A couple of quotes from the Globe and Mail's latest http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/haiti/canadian-sailors-reach-d... do little to ease my anxieties about the nature of our national response:
"We need water and medicine," said local resident Sam Moly. "We got nothing [from international community]. Everything we do, we do for ourselves." HMCS Athabaskan brings little in terms of actual food and water, but is more equipped to provide support to existing agencies, to provide leadership in chaotic communities and to better assess their needs and priorities."
So, let me get this straight: this is one of the two naval destroyers that sailed off to great fanfare last week, to fight the good fight in Haiti. I think Peter Mackay had a 'Mission Accomplished' moment on the docks and maybe The Asshole Himself was there too, I can't remember. But since destroyers can't actually carry much besides weapons and soldiers, this one's sudden appearance off the coast, a week after the quake when all those trapped or critically injured have long since perished is about as much use as a wet fart in a thunderstorm.
But they can provide 'support to existing agencies'. What agencies would those be? The local ones completely destroyed in the earthquake, or the foreign ones that aren't there? And if not food and water, just what sort of support are we talking about? Web design tutorials? Video-conferencing? Shiatsu and aromatherapy?
Oh, and don't forget the 'leadership'. Because one thing these desperately poor, self-sufficient, longsuffering people need is leadership. They just love it when well-fed foreign whiteys show up to offer leadership.
"The effort in Haiti is moving from rescue to relief, said army engineer Captain Blaine Thurston: treating secondary infections, performing cleanup tasks and maintaining peace and security....
Roughly 50 sailors were expected on shore by day's end, their principal responsibility to provide security and perform reconnaissance work in advance of the possible arrival of members of the Quebec-based Royal 22e Regiment."
So, after a few days at sea, our brave sailors get to strut about in military costumes and automatic weapons, practicing their macho poses for the cameras, intimidating the shell-shocked locals and 'maintain peace and security' over a corpse-filled ruin.
Oh, and 'perform reconnaissance', er, drive about in heavily armed SUVs, oggling the damage, before fucking off back to the ship for three squares, beer and a movie.
While I figure the Belgian medical staff that evacuated a functional hospital last night in UN trucks, leaving all the wounded AND untreated behind, get the top prize so far for cultural sensitivity - but of course, they cut their teeth in the Congo - its good to see our boys and girls in uniform doing us proud.
As was suggested on the NDP and Haiti thread - excellent material at Democracy Now:
http://www.democracynow.org
This evening's As It Happens did an excellect interview with the Montreal Gazette's Sue Montgomery in Cite Soleil in Part 1. Part 2 has a piece on the unsuccessful attempts of 'Nicole' to get Canada to do the right thing by allowing her mother to return with her to Canada:(also on Part 2 of AIH the Guantanamo 'suicides')
http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/latestshow.html
Haiti earthquake: US ships blockade coast to thwart exodus to America.
USA! USA! How many kids did you kill today?!
US Mercenaries Set Sights on Haiti
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100201/scahill
"Private security companies are seeing big dollar signs in Haiti...
The current US program under which armed security companies work for the State Department in Iraq - the Worldwide Personal Protection Program - has its roots in Haiti during the Clinton administration.
In 1994, private US forces, such as Dyna Corp, became a staple of US operations in the country following the overthrow of Jean Bertrand Aristide by CIA backed death squads.."
Well, the Belgian doctors who evacuated (not last night, but a few days ago) were evacuated because they didn't have any security . . . security which you are now arguing against providing.
MSF says aid plane prevented from landing in Haiti
The cargo plane, carrying drugs, surgical supplies and two dialysis machines, "was turned away three times from Port-au-Prince airport since Sunday night despite repeated assurances of its ability to land there," MSF said in a statement.
"This 12-ton cargo was part of the contents of an earlier plane carrying a total of 40 tons of supplies that was blocked from landing on Sunday morning," the statement from the French-founded organisation said.
"Since January 14, MSF has had five planes diverted from the original destination of Port-au-Prince to the Dominican Republic. These planes carried a total of 85 tons of medical and relief supplies."
The statement did not give any reason for the planes' having been turned away or say who had prevented them from landing, however US forces control the airport in Port-au-Prince.
Blocking humanitarian aid is illegal according to the UN. And yet the US has done this to more than just Haiti in recent times.
It's too bad they aren't the Khmer Rouge or some group like that. US Hawks would pull out all the stops to see that the aid and some other stuff got through without a hitch, if that was the case.
Haiti's Classquake:
http://haitianalysis.com/2010/1/19/haiti-s-classquake
"With masses of people unable to get critical emergency medical care, water and basic supplies, the lack of local state infrastructure and personnel is plainly apparent..
Giving priority to unloading heavy weaponry, US forces have turned away a number of large planes
It's Time to Investigate the Aid Fiasco
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/01/19-9
Haiti remains a death trap, with an aid program that has sat by and watched thousands die without relief.
There has been criminal negligence here, not just mistakes. It is worse than "bottlenecks". Who will blow the whistle?
US Troops Take Over Palace
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article69940...
"US troops swooped down in helicopters to take control of Haiti's ruined presidential palace today..
'I haven't seen the Americans in the streets giving out water and food, but now they come to the palace,' said said Wilson Guillaume, as some of the homeless living rough in the Champ de Mars Square before the palace shouted abuse at the Americans.
It's an occupation. The palace is our power, our face, our pride,' added Feodor Descanges, another bystander"
A Week After Haiti Quake - Aid Elusive
http://www.inform.com/article/A%20week%20after%20Haiti%20quake%2C%20aid%...
"The world still can't get enough food and water to the hungry and thirsty one week after an earthquake shattered Haiti's capital.
The airport remains a bottleneck, the port is a shambles. The Haiti government is invisible, nobody has taken firm charge, and the police have largely given up...
'God has abandoned us! The foreigners have abandoned us!' yelled Micheline Ursulin, tearing her hair as she rushed past a large pile of decaying bodies. Three of her children died in the quake.."
Nodifference if you took half the time you spent posting articles and put it towards raising money for Haiti I think you could buy a jet full of supplies.
Or two
thanks but there's lots doing that - sounds pretty dodgy to me. I'd be happy just to raise a little consciousness instead...
No 'Hope for Haiti' Without Justice:
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/01/20101196265844450.html
"there is little doubt that most of the funds raised will wind up lining the pockets of corrupt local elites and their US and international corporate and NGO allies.."
Well, the Belgian doctors who evacuated (not last night, but a few days ago) were evacuated because they didn't have any security . . . security which you are now arguing against providing.
When every tool in your kit is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. In Haiti we see the world's largest military and its wannabe northern neighbor busily converting a humanitarian disaster into a 'security issue' on the back of a United Nations military presence that regards the local populace as hostiles best viewed down the gunsights of an automatic weapon from the back of an APC.
The Belgians are pathetic assholes because instead of using the eyes and ears God gave them they followed UN advice and evacuated. The CNN reporter covering this, himself a doctor, had sufficient wit to treat security concerns as alarmist nonsense and spent the night in the abandoned field hospital attending the abandoned patients. All that happened through the night was that more injured people trickled in - as you'd expect, somehow, if you weren't so willing to think that poor black Haitians who've just survived a holocaust are a 'security risk' instead of desperate victims who deserve only the same human dignity you would have accorded to yourself.
The only security risk is in the warped racist perspective of the relief effort's leadership, which risks provoking violence as it continues to treat innocent victims like criminals. This is corroborated by Democracy Now's Amy Goodman who has been touring the city without incident at all hours of the day and night since the weekend, and other reporters not embedded in the MSM or the self-serving efforts of various military units. Their reports CONSISTENTLY reference the surprising lack of aid on the ground, the high degree of resiliency and self-organization among the neighbourhoods and the notable absence of criminal activity.
Naturally after a week without food and water, tempers will flare at aid distribution points. This is confirmation of humanity not criminality.
I'm watching Trouble The Water, about Katrina, and there was a clip of heavilly armed policemen protecting Harrah's Casino - just chillin' out in front. I wonder if the same will happen in Haiti - are there also corporate thugs there that feel they need protection?
Great post, Merowe. And thanks, NDPP, for keeping your temper in the face of baiting. Keep posting those links please.
There has been a 6.1 "after shock" this morning, more devastation, more rubble, more dead and injured.
CBC News on the aftershock
Reuters
BBC
Washington Shuts Door on Haitian Refugees
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/jan2010/hait-j20.shtml
"That US officials are planning for 'worsening conditions' in Haiti over the 'coming weeks' - beyond the desperate situation that prevails there now - is a damning admission that Washington has no intention to make available widespread relief, much less rebuild Haiti.
The State Department has gone so far as to refuse visas for sick and dying Haitians seeking treatment at an emergency field hospital adjacent to Miami's airport. Dr. William ONeil, dean of the University of Miami medical school, which established the hospital, called the callous policy 'beyond insane'.
Meanwhile, the rescue operation - the ostensible purpose for the US military presence - has proven such a debacle that even the media has been forced to make note of its obvious failure to deliver food, water and medicine to the Haitian people.."
Real News: Haiti - Guns or Food? (vid)
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24436.htm
"As aid starts to trickle in, and the extent of the horror becomes known, decisions are already being made that will affect the Haiti that emerges from this. Post earthquake Haiti will further cement the domination of the Haitian people by foreigners..."
The IMF to Haiti: Freeze Public Wages
Now, in its attempts to help Haiti, the IMF is pursuing the same kinds of policies that made Haiti a geography of precariousness even before the quake. To great fanfare, the IMF announced a new $100 million loan to Haiti on Thursday. In one crucial way, the loan is a good thing; Haiti is in dire straits and needs a massive cash infusion. But the new loan was made through the IMF's extended credit facility, to which Haiti already has $165 million in debt. Debt relief activists tell me that these loans came with conditions, including raising prices for electricity, refusing pay increases to all public employees except those making minimum wage and keeping inflation low. They say that the new loans would impose these same conditions. In other words, in the face of this latest tragedy, the IMF is still using crisis and debt as leverage to compel neoliberal reforms.
Jebus cripes crap.
Shock doctrine.
From Maysie's CBC link, and thanks maysie for the links...
Bottlenecks at the damaged harbour and at the capital's airport continue to make it difficult to distribute supplies
And yet cruise ships have no problems at the "private" docks.
Aid Workers Frustrated with Relief Effort:
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/01/20/haiti.frustration/index...
"Anger boiled over on the streets of Haiti's capital Tuesday--not just from residents who have gone a week without food or water, but from the people who are supposed to be providing it. Relief workers say help is not reching many of the 2 million residents in Port au Prince who need aid, because those who are supposed to be coordinating the efforts are inept.
'It's terrible,' said Erik Klein, head of disaster relief agency CAN-DO, 'There's got to be coordination.' Medical aid is particularly needed, Klein and others said. 'There are medical supplies just sitting at the frigging airport!'
Rescued Haitians Die At Hospital for Lack of Supplies
http://www.katu.com/news/82164772.html
"'He's dying right now in front of our eyes,' said Dr. Roberto Feliz. What's so frustrating is that we don't have the basic equipment that would save him. He's a young, strong guy. In any normal hospital he'd survive.'"
Group Says Conditions Getting Worse in Haiti
http://www.wmur.com/news/22283215/detail.html
"the plight in Haiti is getting worse each day, and the latest quakes made the dire situation even more difficult. 'I don't know how much more we can take,' said Samson Duclair, president of the Haiti Community Center. He said that in one way, the second quake was worse. He said there was more chaos with people running not even knowing where they're going because they know what it is,' Duclair said.
He said that as bad as the conditions are in the city, a pastor in an outlying village told him their situation is worse. 'We don't have no food, no drink - nothing. People are starving to death.'"
Strong Aftershock Rocks Haiti
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/01/2010120113540937346.h...
"The minute the earth shook everyone started to scream, they are praying and singing religious songs. People are still very traumatised here. What we do know is many of the buildings that were already damaged by the earthquake collapsed.
The aftershock came just hours after the United Nations said it would send an additional 3,500 troops and police to Haiti..Defending the UN on Tuesday against criticism that millions of Haitians still do not have food or water, Ban Ki-moon said, 'the situation is overwhelming.'"
Doctors Group Says US 'Blocks' Haiti Medical Aid
http://www.worldbulletin.net/news_detail.php?id=52932
"We cannot accept that planes carrying lifesaving medical supplies and equipment continue to be turned away while our patients die,' said Rosa Crestoni, a MSF medical coordinator at a Port au Prince hospital. 'It is like working in a war situation. We don't have any more morphine to manage pain for our patients.."
Well, the Belgian doctors who evacuated (not last night, but a few days ago) were evacuated because they didn't have any security . . . security which you are now arguing against providing.
When every tool in your kit is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. In Haiti we see the world's largest military and its wannabe northern neighbor busily converting a humanitarian disaster into a 'security issue' on the back of a United Nations military presence that regards the local populace as hostiles best viewed down the gunsights of an automatic weapon from the back of an APC.
The Belgians are pathetic assholes because instead of using the eyes and ears God gave them they followed UN advice and evacuated.
It has been confirmed that the UN gave no such order to evacuate. It was a decision made by the leader of the Belgian team.
Bottlenecks at the damaged harbour and at the capital's airport continue to make it difficult to distribute supplies
And yet cruise ships have no problems at the "private" docks.
Pictures of the cruise ship (well, video and pictures).
While there are all kinds of concerns about cruise ships and tourists showing up at a time like this, the cruise ship isn't really "docking" - it is anchored in a bay - so at least it's not taking up strained port resources.
Democracy Now: How Western Domination Has Undermined Haiti's Ability to Recover:
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/1/20/journalist_kim_ives_on_how_decades
"Why can't President Aristide come back? He wants to. He has said so. The government hasn't given or renewed his diplomatic passport which has expired. They haven't given him a laisser-passer to come to the country. That's all that's needed.
If the government of Barack Obama or any other government wanted to really provide support here, even maybe more than all the C-130s we see offloading not just food and medical supplies, but guns and lots of them,
this would be to send a plane to South Africa and bring Aristide here. It would create such a tremendous groundswell, a counter-earthquake, if you will, of popular hope and pride and victory, that it would go a long way to rebuilding the necessary moral balance to weather the storm.."
Don't aid workers have the right to fear for their own safety?
From Maysie's CBC link, and thanks maysie for the links...
Bottlenecks at the damaged harbour and at the capital's airport continue to make it difficult to distribute supplies
And yet cruise ships have no problems at the "private" docks.
There are a number of really ignorant posts in this thread, this one is no more particular then several others, but honestly, it shouldn't take a lot of thought to see the difference between anchoring a cruise ship off shore of a beach and trying to unload tons of cargo at a ruined port with no infrastructure. Some of you need to stop looking for the boogeyman in every closet, the reality of this situation is terrible enough without it, are there no depths to which you will not sink in order to score ideological points? I think no, though no doubt it's mere moments before the americans start lobbing bombs and missles from thier evil war machines..I think some of you would be happier if we provided no aid at all, what a delicious feeding frenzy that would provide, and while you are sharpening your knives others are actually doing something.
Holy crap, that was inspiring - where do I enlist?
US Humanitarian Aid Looks More Like US Invasion
http://www.blackagendareport.com?q=content/us-humanitarian-aid-looks-mor...
"If everything the United States does appears to be related to its imperial mission, that's because it's true.
It is understandable that many African Americans are making comparisons between the militarized character of the US intervention in Haiti's earthquake disaster and the federal government's largely military response to the Katrina catastrophe in New Orleans...
For all practical purposes, the US Southern Command is the occupying power in Haiti.
What we are observing is imperialism in action - under cover of disaster.."
I feel the same way Yarg. I don't think anyone here would prefer if we sent NO aid at all but that's how some posters almost come across doesn't it? I see the need to be critical in situations like this and not all yay us you're everyones saviors but some people seem more interested in being critical for the sake of being critical.
Good point about the difference between a cruise ship putting anchor down in the middle of a bay and a cargo ship unloading thousands of tons of equipment. Comments like these are made by people who are looking for boogymen and don't have any practical knowledge about what they are talking about. Too much time spent looking for the boogyman in every closet means the real thieves will walk in your front door.
If Canada sends aid it gets criticized. Not enough, not getting there fast enough.
If Canada doesn't send enough aid it gets criticized for not sending enough.
If we send in the army we get accused of a hostile take over.
If we don't send the army people yell where the hell is the army?
If we send security we get accused of being distracted from the real issues.
If we don't send security and relief workers are too fearful to venture out we get accused of letting down the people of Haiti.
I didn't want to say anything because someone brought up a good point in another thread. Why are we being critical of people who are critical on a critical forum Okay, point taken. Some people take it a little too far though IMO. . I would probably feel better about being THAT critical (about everything) if I donated more than $15 or I was actually heading to Haiti to help out. I'm a chicken shit I'm staying home flying gives me anxeity attacks I would pobably die in Haiti because I would step somewhere I shouldn't and fall or something. I'm okay with being afraid of something like that but I have a lot of respect for the workers who fly across the world to go help out.
I just can't understand how some can be as critical as they are.
Sparky and Yarg you won't win this one!
That exactly what the forum is "Why are we being critical of people who are critical on a critical forum" I learnt Quickly!!!!
But in any case, who says most of us may not have donated more than $15 or are not organizing fundraisers as we speak?
Gee whiz golly. Sophisticated military cannot land desperately needed supplies on sandy level beach. I am totally impressed with the ability of the greatest military power in the world.
If there was a Cuban facility at that beach instead of the Royal Caribbean they would be integrating it into the supply chain and getting desperately needed boxes of medical supplies on to the beach instead of playing volleyball and drinking beer. Haiti just another failed state that has had American interference for more than a century. The worst recipe for those poor people is be more American "aid."
As for fund raising I will do some now. Please give generously to the Cuban relief teams on the ground who are not carrying weapons only medical supplies.
Canadian Network on Cuba
www.canadiannetworkoncuba.ca
January 18, 2010
Dear Friends,
In response to the horrendous suffering of the Haitian people resulting from the earthquake and its many aftershocks, many Canadians have been wondering what the most effective way to provide aid is. The Canadian-Cuban Friendship Association of Toronto has proposed the Cuba for Haiti fundraising campaign which is also endorsed by the Canadian Network on Cuba as a national effort.
Cuba has an unequalled record in helping people in crises such as the earthquake in Pakistan and natural disasters in many other countries. In fact it has set up a special emergency unit, the Henry Reeve Medical Brigade, to respond to such disasters. At the time of the earthquake in Haiti, 402 Cuban internationalists, 302 of them medical personnel, had already been helping Haitians. These together with many of the 500 Haitian doctors who had been trained in Cuba free of charge formed the essential early group of lifesavers, attending to 1,102 Haitian patients in the first 24 hours after the earthquake. They have continued their work, boosted by an additional medical brigade which arrived promptly from Cuba.
We believe that this kind of unprecedented and invaluable help which Cuba has been giving Haiti for eleven years deserves to be supported as strongly as possible. The CNC urges you to support Cuba in this work by giving a donation to “The Mackenzie-Papineau Memorial Fund,” indicating on your cheque’s memo line “Cuba for Haiti”.
Charitable receipts will be issued by the Mackenzie-Papineau Memorial Fund (Charitable Org - Revenue Canada Reg, #88876 9197RR0001).
Your donation should be mailed to:
The Mackenzie-Papineau Memorial Fund &
Friends of the Mac-Pap Battalion, Int'l Brigades
Att: S. Skup
56 Riverwood Terrace
Bolton, ON L7E 1S4
The “Cuba for Haiti” contributions will go into a special account, ensuring that 100% of all donations are used for medical support and aid to Haiti. We are working directly with The Cuban Embassy in Ottawa and the Consulate General in Toronto.
Sincerely,
Isaac Saney, CNC Co-chair & and National Spokesperson,
Tamara Hansen, CNC Co-Chair
Keith Ellis, CNC Coordinator “Cuba for Haiti”
The bolded part above is what earthquake relief is supposed to be about.
Let's hear it for Obama. The new American invasion is three days old. It's such a classic; take the airports, the port, and the radio stations. 10,000 automatic weopons, predators flying overhead and the mass media fully fed. The Haitians are as well off as they are inspite of the USA, not because of it. The coup in the USA is going well too! Every soldier there should be black and speak creole to boot. I'm sorry, I retract that; there should be no soldiers there and those guys don't have a problem with lawlessness, they may have a problem with outsiders and thieves. Silk underwear on Wall Street and malnutician for the kids.
Here in Vancouver we expect the invasion in 20 days, you can see the groundwork all over the city for the "Olympics". rah Albert Speers architecture everywhere and the teachers are getting laid off. Getting American aid is is like watching the bombing of Iraq. Is there anybody they haven't bombed?
Just to keep my hyperbole in check ask how is it that a single suicide bomber can kill 8 CIA agents in a permanent office in a remote 'Ghani village; how many offices are there? 2, 20, 200. 2000, 20,000, I think larger. at least one more zero and that ain't democracy.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/...
Some highlights of the article
The gangsters have stepped into the law and order vacuum, notably in the sprawling shanty town of Cite Soleil which they dominated before being locked up following police operations supported by United Nations troops over the last three years.
"Even as we are digging bodies out of buildings, they are trying to attack our officers," said Aristide Rosemond a Cite Soleil police inspector.
The Haitian authorities, already weak and reliant on UN forces, are now crippled by heavy casualties and widespread destruction of infrastructure while international peacekeepers are focused on disaster relief.
Jean-Max Bellerive, Haiti's prime minister, has despaired of the state's ability to tackle a new post-earthquake crime wave sweeping his country's devastated capital.
"The problem is they have weapons so we cannot send the population or just any policemen to capture them," he said.
The morale and strength of Haiti's police has been severely reduced by the loss of experienced officers, killed or injured, leaving recently trained recruits to hold the line.
"We do not have the capacity to fix this situation. Haiti needs help. The Americans are welcome here. But where are they? We need them here on the street with us," said Dorsainvil Robenson, a police officer.
Police officers, whose limited success against slum gang lords has been based on the support of armoured UN troops, have now effectively given up by appealing to local vigilantes to take the law into their own hands.
"If you don't kill the criminals, they will all come back," Haitian police officers announce over loudspeakers from heavily armed checkpoints in the slum area.
Residents say that people have been killed and several women raped in a turf war between gangsters nicknamed "Belony" and "Bled" in the six days following the earthquake which destroyed the prison.
"The trouble is starting," said Jean-Semaine Delice, a 51-year-old father.
What's your definition of lawlessness EP Houle?
Most Canadians have never known a similar chaotic event. Except for the ice storm that hit Ottawa Valley and parts of Quebec in 1998. I remember hearing about some panicked Canadians then who were screaming at authorites because their telephone service was out, or they were without electricity for a number of days. There were even reports of Canadians thieving other Canadians portable generators in the Ottawa area. I thought to myself at the time, so much for thoughts of Canadians being above all that. The first tight situtation that comes along, and some of us take to acting like hoodlums.
.... so then apparently the cruise ship that took a tonage of bottled water, in order to try and make a positive PR optic, on big pallets. can't off load them then, if they just moor off shore!
But yet they did!
:rolleyes:
And oh look...now we get a "gangster meme", going on for good measure!
FFS
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/...
Some highlights of the article
The gangsters have stepped into the law and order vacuum, notably in the sprawling shanty town of Cite Soleil which they dominated before being locked up following police operations supported by United Nations troops over the last three years.
"Even as we are digging bodies out of buildings, they are trying to attack our officers," said Aristide Rosemond a Cite Soleil police inspector.
The Haitian authorities, already weak and reliant on UN forces, are now crippled by heavy casualties and widespread destruction of infrastructure while international peacekeepers are focused on disaster relief.
Jean-Max Bellerive, Haiti's prime minister, has despaired of the state's ability to tackle a new post-earthquake crime wave sweeping his country's devastated capital.
"The problem is they have weapons so we cannot send the population or just any policemen to capture them," he said.
The morale and strength of Haiti's police has been severely reduced by the loss of experienced officers, killed or injured, leaving recently trained recruits to hold the line.
"We do not have the capacity to fix this situation. Haiti needs help. The Americans are welcome here. But where are they? We need them here on the street with us," said Dorsainvil Robenson, a police officer.
Police officers, whose limited success against slum gang lords has been based on the support of armoured UN troops, have now effectively given up by appealing to local vigilantes to take the law into their own hands.
"If you don't kill the criminals, they will all come back," Haitian police officers announce over loudspeakers from heavily armed checkpoints in the slum area.
Residents say that people have been killed and several women raped in a turf war between gangsters nicknamed "Belony" and "Bled" in the six days following the earthquake which destroyed the prison.
"The trouble is starting," said Jean-Semaine Delice, a 51-year-old father.
What's your definition of lawlessness EP Houle?
Yes, the media is having a field day creating the perception of violence being committed by the poor. Yet we know men have been bound and killed in cold blood by men describing themselves as "plain clothes police". And we know the police allowed a mob to take a prisoner who was then dragged from a vehicle, beaten, and set on fire. Yes, but it is the poor in the slums who are violent. Send in the thugs with guns to massacre the poor! Liars.
Sue Montgomery, writing for the Montreal Gazette, has been stationed in Cite de Soleil and has been sleeping on the ground, outdoors, on cardboard. She said, yesterday, on CBC, she is safe, the slum residents are open and friendly, giving, and generous, and there is no violence. She is there, among them, and has nothing to earn nor gain from inventing a perception of danger or safety.
CBC Podcast
But yet they did!
Turns out I was wrong: the ships don't just moor offshore - and I finally found a picture of this fabled dock:
Cruiseships can now Dock in Labadee Beach Haiti (11/12/09)This would be absolutely useless for cargo - no access for vehicles, no gantry, nothing. It would be a complete waste of time for any ship to try and off load supplies here.
Plus, I guess you didn't bother to do some research as to where it's docking (other than "Haiti"). From Labadee to Cap-Haitian it's 6-7 km over an unpaved road - only another 200 km to go to Port-au-Prince.
The Militarization of Emergency Aid to Haiti: Is it a Humanitarian Operation or an Invasion?
Recent US Military Interventions in Haiti...
Haiti is another US-managed client state.
SparkyOne,
Have you considered that the Lawlessness is that the plantation owner's thugs are being turned back?Fidel "Haiti is another client-state", code for plantation. Before this I never thought this was State Department of USA channel. That isn't a Unionist and that's not Fidel!
E
A Haiti Disaster Relief Scenario was Envisaged by the US Military One Day Before the Earthquake
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17122
"A Haiti disaster-relief scenario had been envisaged at the headquarters of US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) in Miami one day prior to the earthquake..
The TISC is an essential component of the militarization of emergency relief. The US Military through DISA oversees the Information Communications Sharing System controlled by the US military, which is made available to approved non governmental partner organizations involved in Haiti relief efforts.
The fundamental concept underlying DISA's Transnational Information Sharing Cooperation project (TISC) is to 'Achieve Interoperability with Warfighters, Coalition Partners and NGOs'
There are no details on the nature of the tests conducted on January 11 at SOUTHCOM"
'Only the Strong' Get Haiti Aid:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/01/21/2797407.htm?section=justin
"I think now, if the aid is not distributed, it's time for us to start pointing fingers. Now the aid is there, at the airport, let's get it out."
The Real Looting in Haiti
http://www.accuracy.org/newsrelease.php?articleId=2157
"The real looting in Haiti is not the people trying to get food to survive. The real looting of Haiti is the economic policies of the US and France [and Canada] as well as institutions such as the IMF and World Bank, in addition to the disaster capitalism that is fast setting in. In Haiti, 200 years of crippling debt imposed by France, the US and other colonial powers drained the country's financial resources.
Military occupation and presidential coups coordinated and funded by the US have devastated the nation's government infrastructure. Although the country has more than 10,000 NGOs, many of them are profiteering off the small nation's misery.."
Haiti, Katrina and Why I Won't Give to Haiti Through the Red Cross:
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=content/haiti-katrina-and-why-i-wont...
Haiti's Tragedy: A Crime of US Imperialism
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/jan2010/pers-j21.shtml
"Now for an entire week, with the whole world watching, millions of Haitians have been left abandoned without medical care, food water or shelter, as US military cargo planes have ferried in thousands of soldiers and Marines, and US Naval and Coast Guard vessels have mounted patrols off Haiti's shores to prevent anyone from trying to escape.
The absence of any concerted rescue effort is not an accident, nor is the agonizingly slow arrival of food, water and medicine in far from adequate quantities, merely a matter of logistics. The claim that the US military, which was able to pour a quarter of a million troops into Iraq and conquer Baghdad within barely 2 weeks, could not rush water, food and supplies to traumatized earthquake survivors 700 miles from the US mainland, is a contemptible lie.
What is involved is a deliberate and sinister policy characterized by a gross indifference to human life that borders on the genocidal.."
Haiti's Dying Elderly Says 'Nobody Cares'
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34969140/ns/world_news-haiti_earthquake/
"More than a week after their nursing home collapsed, dozens of elderly Haitians are still begging for food and medicine in a downtown Port-au-Prince slum barely a mile from the international airport where tons of aid are pouring in.
'It's as if everybody has forgotten us, nobody cares,' said Phileas Julien, 78, a sometimes delerious blind man in a wheelchair who has appointed himself spokesman for the 84 surviving residents. 'Or maybe they really do just want us to starve to death."
'We're hungry, we're so hungry,' lamented 77 year old Felice Colin, one of those who still had enough energy to speak intelligibly at Sunset Wednesday. 'There's such a desperate need...' She expressed anger at the seeming lack of outside interest in the residents of the nursing home, which is close to the area around the collapsed presidential palace and Roman Catholic cathederal which teem with journalists and international relief teams.."
Haiti's Mass Graves, Doctors Overloaded
http://www.newsnet5.com/news/22299227/detail.html
"Workers are carving out mass graves on a hillside north of Haiti's capital, using earth movers to bury 10,000 earthquake victims in a single day while relief workers warn the death toll could increase.
Medical clinics have 12 day patient backlogs, untreated injuries are festering and makeshift camps having thousands of survivors could foster disease experts said.."
US Military Operations Block Relief Efforts in Haiti:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/jan2010/hait-j21.shtml
'The US military intervention in Haiti, after the January 12 earthquake that killed an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 people, continues to block arrival of critical supplies to the devastated country. Quake victims - including hundreds of thousands of wounded and an estimated 3 million Haitians made homeless - lack access to food, water and life saving medical equipment.."
Imagine having to truck a hospital for hundreds of kilometers from the Dominican Republic but allowing thousands of troops to land as well as a plane with Hillary to tell the locals how good America is too them. She should be charged with the murder of any victims who died instead of being treated by MSF.
If America wants to make the world a safer place they should withdraw their military to within their borders. Better yet since they are so committed to democracy lets have a UN overseen election in all countries with American bases and let the people have a referendum on whether they want the Americans in their country. That will never happen because the US is anti-democratic just ask Aristide.
Long thread. Feel free to start another.