Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 26 aout 2021

 Earthquake in Haiti

by Amy Wilentz | Aug 14, 2021 

Oh, mesi, Bon Dye, one can imagine Ariel Henry, the interim Prime Minister of Haiti, saying this morning. Thank you, Lord… not because Henry likes earthquakes or doesn’t care about the people of his country but because a 7.2 earthquake just off shore—with hundreds of buildings down, and more than 700 counted dead so far and doubtless several thousand more to come, and roads impassable, and a possible tsunami rising, and a tropical storm on the way to create mudslides and more destruction and death—is easier to deal with than the investigation of the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise. The quake also struck on an important day for Haitians: today, August 14, which is the day when a legendary Vaudou ceremony was held at Bois Cayman in 1791, inaugurating Haiti’s world-changing revolution against France. Demonstrations against Henry’s government were planned for today. Cancelled. More for Henry to be thankful for.

Dealing with the limited Haitian judicial system in a highly politicized assassination is difficult and dangerous, and the assassination investigation already shows signs of a probe that will be interminable and probably fruitless.

On the other hand, Haitian governments know how to deal with earthquakes: They invite the international community in.

Not much more that they can do: you can see it all online today. They can pick up rubble with their bare hands, and they are doing that and rescuing people. They can bring the injured to local clinics that haven’t fallen down, and they are doing that. They can give them first aid themselves, and they’re doing that, using the water in their personal water bottles to wash wounds, among other acts of generosity and personal kindness. They can run from the possible tsunami toward the hills, and they’re doing that.

But the kind of resources that, say, Western European nations have for dealing with natural disasters (the stuff we saw in Germany during their floods, for example) Haitians don’t have, in large part because their state has been stolen from them by nefarious and manipulative businessmen, about ten to twenty of them in this era, who wheel and deal and steal, have taken over almost every important sector of the economy, and have convinced the international community that they are critical to Haiti’s development, when in fact they are among the biggest roadblocks that stand in the way.

Almost all of Haiti’s helicopters, for example, are privately owned by people in this group, and there’s not much money in the national coffer to pay the private sector for the emergency use of these things, the treasury having been massively looted during the previous two administrations of Presidents Michel Martelly and his protegé, the late President Moise. Of course, some of the members of this business mafya, as they are known in Haiti, will come through during an emergency, presenting themselves as patriots and offering things for free. But every favor in Haiti is paid forward down the line.

Another problem for Haitians trying to help each other during the earthquake’s aftermath are the gangs that have taken control of the southern exit of the capital and who thus block all access to the country’s biggest hospitals and best services. Today an ambulance carrying eleven victims was stopped by a gang and turned away from the southern entrance to Port-au-Prince in Martissant, which has been run by gangs for the past two months. Its passengers were held for ransom. Meanwhile major international media outlets had to rent helicopters to avoid the gangs and get out to where the damage is worst.

These street gangs are the leftovers of the Martelly/Moise era, and have been underwritten and armed by members of the mafya and their government cronies; they’re an essential part of the mafya’s business plan.

Soon, the U.S. will be back down in Haiti with a relief and recovery effort, along with Canada and no doubt others, same cast as after the even crueler earthquake of 2010, which struck at a shallower depth under the overcrowded, under-constructed capital of Port-au-Prince and killed an estimated 200,000 plus. This time relief and reconstruction will be run by Samantha Power, administrator of USAID under Biden. Last time it was Bill Clinton who ran the huge American response, under Obama, during which millions of dollars went unaccounted for and Haitians didn’t get much relief. Clinton along with his wife, who was then secretary of state, set the stage for all that has followed in Haiti: they helped certify the questionable elections of both post-earthquake presidents and thus allowed the rise of the corrupt and negligent Martelly-Moise administrations, and their criminal supporters… and the consequent ascension of the angry young shantytown gangs who now control the streets and highways of Haiti.

This morning, President Biden said, “I have authorized an immediate US response and named USAID Administrator Samantha Power as the senior US official to coordinate this effort.” We like to believe that Biden at least discussed this with Henry first, but…  We do know that Power had a good conversation with the Prime Minister after Biden’s announcement.

In any case, we can only hope and pray that Power does a better job than the Clinton duo. The last earthquake came at the end of the two-decade, on-and-off relay of the presidency between the progressive Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his protege René Préval. The questionable 2011 election of Martelly, a hardline right-winger, signaled to Haitians that the era of trying (though perhaps not achieving) real democracy had come to an end, and that the international community was once again willing to put its considerable weight behind Haitian politicians who seemed to have as their primary goal a kind of authoritarian pro-business stability, even if voters didn’t much like them. In the end, during the Martelly/Moise regnum, stability was nowhere on the agenda—no measures were taken to achieve it.

Perhaps this earthquake will lead to a similar and more profound (reverse) changing of the guard. (Hands clasped together in fervent hope…) For the moment though, the Moise assassination has left the same element in charge of Haiti who were in charge when Moise was alive. That single chess piece has been eliminated, but the rest of the team is still in place. Indeed, the earthquake seems to have offered Prime Minister Henry a backdoor to a new U.S. military intervention in Haiti, which is something that was proposed immediately after he took office, with US benediction, in early July. That proposal was rejected by Haitian civil society, and Biden did not warm to it, but with the earthquake, things have changed. Steeples are fallen in the roads, hotels pancaked, schools destroyed… and perhaps Haitian sovereignty, as well.

Anyway, now Henry can work with Power to help Haitians cope with the earthquake, while possibly turning away from the supremely difficult task of naming, arresting, and trying the perpetrators of the Moise assassination. The earthquake is virtually a gift from God for him. Politically, bringing the assassins to justice is almost an impossibility for Henry, who was part and parcel of the governmental apparatus surrounding the late president, and—as Prime Minister—represents in a way the culmination and the continuation of Moise’s rule, his appointment to that position having been Moise’s last act in office, very shortly before Moise was killed.  Henry would be risking… a lot …. if he actually were to hunt down and prosecute the real perpetrators and intellectual authors of the crime. Because, and I will say this only once, the dead president, his friends, and his enemies were all part of the same corrupt group that’s been running Haiti for a decade. Any one of Moise’s cohort could have helped authorize the killing (obviously, there are others to suspect outside of that circle).

Already members of the investigative team looking into the assassination have had to go into hiding because they know or might reveal facts about the crime.  For now, the probe continues, and investigators scratch their collective chin. Who did it? Well, let’s say this: Someone knows.

Will the truth ever be revealed?

Ask the killers of Lebanon’s Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated in a massive explosion on a main street in Beirut in 2005. As Marlise Simons wrote in The New York Times this week, a tribunal established to prosecute the assassins of Hariri failed to show who ordered the attack, or why, after twelve years of investigation and $800 million spent.

That probe is now closed.

How to help Haiti ? Ask its citizens.

The timing could not have been worse. Just five weeks after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse plunged Haiti into political chaos, a 7.2 magnitude earthquake ripped through the nation’s rural southwest coast, buckling roads, leveling tens of thousands of homes, and reducing already flimsy infrastructure to rubble. Residents and aid workers were still taking stock when a tropical storm descended upon the region.

Nothing snaps the world to attention like a natural disaster. Haiti has been here before. In 2010, when a similar magnitude quake struck the capital city of Port-au-Prince, the entire globe, it seemed, reached out to help. 

But within two years, just half of the funds had been delivered, and the world’s attention had long since moved on. Haiti was back where it started – alone in the dark.

In the intervening years, much of the news out of Haiti has centered around misappropriation of donated funds.

“We have a fair amount of hubris when it comes to intervening in other countries and thinking we know what’s best for them,” says Robert Maguire, a retired international affairs professor. “We don’t have a very good track record in listening to the people in these places and hearing what they are telling us.”

“The look for quick results has really gotten in the way of the longer, slower work of helping to reinforce and create institutions,” he adds. 

Money is needed, of course, but equally important are patience and a willingness to recognize the agency and expertise of the Haitian community. 

“The same people who survived and rebuilt after 2010, they are still there,” says Kathie Klarreich, a journalist who lived in Haiti for two decades. “The honest, hardworking humanitarians who live there will surface.”

B.M.

*U.S. steps back from call for Haiti elections this year after quake, virus and assassination*

_BY MICHAEL WILNER_

_UPDATED AUGUST 17, 2021 05:36 PM_

The Biden administration is no longer calling for elections in Haiti to be held this year as it assesses the political repercussions of the recent earthquake, which devastated part of the country just weeks after the president was assassinated.

The 7.2 magnitude earthquake that leveled buildings in Southwest Haiti on Saturday has only heightened U.S. concern over the security situation as gang activity and the probe into President Jovenel Moïse’s July 7 killing have overstretched the Haitian National Police.

“It’s too early to tell what the impact on the political process of the earthquake is,” Jake Sullivan, White House national security advisor, said at a press briefing. “We’re in the process of assessing that.”

A senior administration official told McClatchy earlier Tuesday that the White House supports Haiti holding new elections when possible, citing the earthquake, assassination and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

“We strongly support holding elections as soon as they are viable,” the official said. “Even pre-earthquake, they’re in the middle of a pandemic, and the security situation was one that was concerning.”

The comments from both officials are a step back from repeated calls from the State Department for elections in Haiti to be held this year after Moïse’s murder.

“The policy remains that we want to make sure Haitians can freely and fairly exercise their right to vote,” the senior administration official said. “Right now the focus is on an immediate response to the aftermath of the earthquake.”

Officials do not anticipate the scale of the devastation to compare with the 2010 earthquake which struck near the Haitian capital and resulted in an estimated 300,000 deaths.

But the humanitarian crisis around the recent earthquake is still expected to be severe, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development. The death toll from the weekend earthquake is now over 1,400.

Haiti’s hospitals have been understaffed, ill-equipped, and filled with COVID-19 patients in a country where very few people have been vaccinated against the coronavirus.

On the day of the assassination, State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters that “it is still the view of the United States that elections this year should proceed” — a position the administration has repeated multiple times since.

Days before the quake, Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council published a new calendar for elections and a controversial constitutional referendum — dates that now seem uncertain.

“The earthquake may delay that process even more now, probably into early 2022,” said Georges Fauriol, an expert on Haiti and senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“That puts a burden on key international supporters, in particular the United States,” Fauriol said, “because the more you move into 2022, the more you hit the historical calendar of presidential terms — and that essentially means you run into ‘22 with the delayed beginning of a normal presidential term.”

Moïse was already governing Haiti by decree before his assassination because the country had failed to hold elections on time. U.S. officials had been pressing Haiti to hold elections as soon as technically feasible to reconstitute parliament and fill local offices.

The new calendar calls for the first round of presidential elections to take place on Nov. 7 and runoffs in January. But in an interview with the Miami Herald on Sunday, Prime Minister Ariel Henry dismissed the new dates.

“We do not have an election calendar,” Henry said.

_McClatchy White House correspondent Francesca Chambers and Miami Herald Caribbean correspondent Jacqueline Charles contributed reporting._

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 9 aout 2021

 Former Colombian Soldiers (HENM) Deny Killing Haitian President

Detained in Haiti, Colombians say they thought they were on a DEA mission to arrest President Jovenel Moïse: ‘We were fooled’

July 30, 2021 8:43 pm ET

PORT-AU-PRINCE—The former Colombian soldiers jailed in Haiti in the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse say they didn’t kill him and thought they were on a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration mission to arrest the leader, lawyers from the Colombian state, who talked to the men, said Friday.

“They said they didn’t know what happened,” said Luis Andrés Fajardo, the No. 2 in Colombia’s human rights agency. He spoke with most of the 18 men for about three hours at a Haitian prison. “It was a trap,” he recalled several saying.

The former servicemen, ex-special operations soldiers who’d fought guerrillas in Colombia, had been hired by a Miami security company and arrived here between May and June, according to relatives, text messages, and Haitians who interacted with them. But the owner of the company and a group of Haitian businessmen, the police here say, instead took part in a plan to assassinate Mr. Moïse.

In the meetings with the lawyers, in which the servicemen for the first time detailed their account for Colombia’s government, the former soldiers repeated the same phrase over and again: “We were fooled.”

Even so, some of the men didn’t speak or spoke little, preferring to spend the time writing letters for Mr. Fajardo’s delegation to take back to their relatives in Colombia. The men had been tightly handcuffed for 24 hours a day for more than a week, they said, and about half of them were cuffed to each other, Mr. Fajardo said.

The DEA declined to comment. It has previously said that individuals who yelled “DEA” at the time of the killing to gain entrance to the president’s home weren’t acting on behalf of the agency.

Mr. Moïse was killed when gunmen stormed his home in Port-au-Prince in the early hours of July 7. Three of the former Colombian soldiers were killed soon after in a shootout with the Haitian police, authorities here said. The 18 Colombians were captured in the days following the attack.

Police have arraigned or implicated more than 40 people during their investigation. They include a Haitian senator, a supreme court judge, a former cocaine trafficker who became a U.S. informant, and several Miami businessmen. Members of the security team assigned to protect Mr. Moïse are being interrogated, and their leader has been charged. Colombia’s chief of police, Gen. Jorge Vargas, said on July 15 that two of the former servicemen plotted with those planning the operation against the Haitian president, basing their comments on the Haitian investigation.

But no clear motive or mastermind has emerged in an investigation involving three countries. 

The 18 Colombians have been kept in a small, roughly 125-square-foot corridor since their arrest. Investigators from the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and Colombia’s government have been in Haiti trying to determine how the crime took place.

Eduardo Florez, a criminal defense lawyer working with the Colombian government’s rights office, said a few of them have minor injuries: an injured foot, stitches in the back of the head. The men had been provided food and water. They told the Colombian lawyers they didn’t want to be transferred from the jail for fear of being killed.

“They are very nervous,” said Mr. Florez, who said they also haven't seen a judge or been formally entered into the court system. “And they are conscious of all that.”

The lawyers from the Colombian human rights delegation are some of the first to gain access to the former servicemen, who haven’t yet been able to secure their own defense attorney. They were able to see them after the Organization of American States and Haiti’s Citizen Protection Office, a human rights body, connected them to relevant officials. A request sent by Colombia’s ambassador to Haiti to the Haitian justice ministry has remained unanswered, Mr. Fajardo added.

On Friday, Colombia’s government expressed concern about the treatment of the men.

The government said Marta Lucía Ramírez, Colombia’s foreign minister, wrote a letter to Haiti’s ambassador in the Andean country, urging Haiti to ensure due process for the Colombians and provide them with legal assistance. Ms. Ramírez said injured detainees haven't received adequate medical treatment and weren’t being guaranteed humanitarian conditions in the jail.

I remind you that your government has the moral and legal obligation to protect detainees under your jurisdiction,” Ms. Ramírez said.

Spokespeople for Haiti’s prime minister and acting president didn’t return requests for comment. Leon Charles, the head of Haiti’s national police, didn’t return calls.

The men have all been repeatedly interviewed by FBI agents and Haitian investigators, the Colombians told Mr. Fajardo.

“There is one thing in all this that is bizarre…they are all in the same room,” the lawyer said. “Normally, in an investigation, if you want to know the truth, you have to separate them.”

In their comments to the lawyers, the men said they had been serving an arrest warrant for the president.

After the president was killed and Haitian authorities responded, putting out a call for the public to help find foreign-speaking gunmen, 11 of the Colombians fled to the Taiwanese embassy. Mr. Fajardo said they still believed they were on a legitimate, government mission. The Taiwanese embassy said it allowed Haitian police to arrest them.

At one point during the lawyer’s visit, Haitian police came in and handed out paper and pens to the men to write letters back home to their families.

“I’m innocent,” wrote one prisoner in a letter to his family which he handed to the lawyers to take back to Colombia.

Mr. Fajardo said the prisoners recalled signing a document in French that they didn’t understand.

Mr. Florez said he thinks the men gave up the right to speak to a lawyer when they talked to the FBI.

The men were hired by CTU, a Miami-based security firm, Haitian authorities have said. A lawyer for its owner, Antonio Intriago, said his client would issue a statement soon. “Our client is innocent and is working to clear his name,” he wrote in an email.

In their Haitian jail, some of the former Colombian soldiers seemed to cling to hope that the company that hired them would resolve the impasse, Mr. Fajardo said.

“They said, ‘What is going to happen to the company we are working for,’ ” he said. “They thought it is going to get them a lawyer and everything.”

—José de Córdoba in Mexico City and Jenny Carolina González in Bogotá, Colombia, contributed to this article.

EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (August 1st, 2021)
Ex. 16, 2-4 +12-15; Ps. 78; Eph. 4, 17, 20-24; Jn. 6, 24-35 By +Guy Sansaricq.

The crowd stunned by the miracle of the multiplication of the breads follows Jesus to the other side of the lake longing for more favors. Jesus begins by scolding them: “You run after me because you have eaten bread and are filled! Run rather after the food that lasts forever, the bread the Father has given you!”

Is it not true that we strain ourselves for passing goods yet find no time for what is permanent and eternal?

The work of God, He continued, is that you believe in the one He sent! Jesus Himself is the supreme treasure we should all long for. For 2000 years millions have found this teaching to be true. What about you? Then, referring to the manna, often called the bread from heaven Jesus stated: “I am the real bread that comes from heaven to give life to the world. I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never hunger; he who believes in me will never thirst!

From this point on, Jesus speaks about the real presence of his body and blood in the bread and wine of the Mass. Ps. 4 warns us that we tend to “love what is worthless and chase after lies.” Jesus is calling us to seek Him who is infinitely superior to all earthly food.”
Learn to seek and find TRUE JOY in your COMMUNION WITH JESUS’ BODY AND BLOOD!!

‘They Thought I Was Dead’: Haitian President’s Widow Recounts Assassination

Struck by gunfire, Martine Moïse lay bleeding as the assassins who killed her husband ransacked her room. Now, she says, the F.B.I. must find the mastermind behind the attack.

July 30, 2021Updated 9:04 a.m. ET

Martine Moïse, first lady of Haiti, in Florida on Thursday. Her husband’s assassins also shot her in the arm.

Maria Alejandra Cardona for The New York Times

MIAMI — With her elbow shattered by gunfire and her mouth full of blood, the first lady of Haiti lay on the floor beside her bed, unable to breathe, as the assassins stormed the room.

“The only thing that I saw before they killed him were their boots,” Martine Moïse said of the moment her husband, President Jovenel Moïse of Haiti, was shot dead beside her. “Then I closed my eyes, and I didn’t see anything else.”

She listened as they ransacked the room, searching methodically for something in her husband’s files, she said. “‘That’s not it. That’s not it,’” she recalled them saying in Spanish, over and over. Then finally: “‘That’s it.’”

The killers filed out. One stepped on her feet. Another waved a flashlight in her eyes, apparently to check to see if she was still alive.

“When they left, they thought I was dead,” she said.

In her first interview since the president’s assassination on July 7, Mrs. Moïse, 47, described the searing pain of witnessing her husband, a man with whom she had shared 25 years, being killed in front of her. She did not want to relive the deafening gunfire, the walls and windows trembling, the terrifying certainty that her children would be killed, the horror of seeing her husband’s body, or how she fought to stand up after the killers left. “All that blood,” she said softly.

The president’s funeral in Cap-Haitien, days after gunmen entered the couple’s official residence and attacked them in their bedroom.Federico Rios for The New York Times

But she needed to speak, she said, because she did not believe that the investigation into his death had answered the central question tormenting her and countless Haitians: Who ordered and paid for the assassination of her husband?

The Haitian police have detained a wide array of people in connection with the killing, including 18 Colombians and several Haitians and Haitian Americans, and they are still seeking others. The suspects include retired Colombian commandos, a former judge, a security equipment salesman, a mortgage and insurance broker in Florida, and two commanders of the president’s security team. According to the Haitian police, the elaborate plot revolves around a 63-year-old doctor and pastor, Christian Emmanuel Sanon, who officials say conspired to hire the Colombian mercenaries to kill the president and seize political power.

But critics of the government’s explanation say that none of the people named in the investigation had the means to finance the plot on their own. And Mrs. Moïse, like many Haitians, believes there must have been a mastermind behind them, giving the orders and supplying the money.

She wants to know what happened to the 30 to 50 men who were usually posted at her house whenever her husband was at home. None of his guards were killed or even wounded, she said. “I don’t understand how nobody was shot,” she said.

Martine Moïse, the first lady of Haiti, this month at a memorial for her assassinated husband, Jovenel Moïse. Federico Rios for The New York Times

At the time of his death, Mr. Moïse, 53, had been in the throes of a political crisis. Protesters accused him of overstaying his term, of controlling local gangs and of ruling by decree as the nation’s institutions were being hollowed out.

Mr. Moïse was also locked in battle with some of the nation’s wealthy oligarchs, including the family that controlled the nation’s electrical grid. While many people described the president as an autocratic leader, Mrs. Moïse said her fellow citizens should remember him as a man who stood up to the rich and powerful.

And now she wants to know if one of them had him killed.

“Only the oligarchs and the system could kill him,” she said.

Dressed in black, with her arm — now limp and perhaps useless forever, she said — wrapped in a sling and bandages, Mrs. Moïse offered an interview in South Florida on the agreement that The New York Times not reveal her whereabouts. Flanked by her children, security guards, Haitian diplomats and other advisers, she barely spoke above a whisper.

She and her husband had been asleep when the sounds of gunfire jolted them to their feet, she recalled. Mrs. Moïse said she ran to wake her two children, both in their early 20s, and urged them to hide in a bathroom, the only room without windows. They huddled there with their dog.

Her husband grabbed his telephone and called for help. “I asked, ‘Honey, who did you phone?’” she said.

Mrs. Moïse said investigators have yet to answer the central question of the case: Who ordered and paid for the assassination of her husband?Matias Delacroix/Associated Press

“He said, ‘I found Dimitri Hérard; I found Jean Laguel Civil,’” she said, reciting the names of two top officials in charge of presidential security. “And they told me that they are coming.”

But the assassins entered the house swiftly, seemingly unencumbered, she said. Mr. Moïse told his wife to lie down on the floor so she would not get hurt.

“‘That’s where I think you will be safe,’” she recalled him saying.

It was the last thing he told her.

A burst of gunfire came through the room, she said, hitting her first. Struck in the hand and the elbow, she lay still on the floor, convinced that she, and everyone else in her family, had been killed.

None of the assassins spoke Creole or French, she said. The men spoke only Spanish, and communicated with someone on the phone as they searched the room. They seemed to find what they wanted on a shelf where her husband kept his files.

“They were looking for something in the room, and they found it,” Mrs. Moïse said.

She said she did not know what it was.

“At this moment, I felt that I was suffocating because there was blood in my mouth and I couldn’t breathe,” she said. “In my mind, everybody was dead, because if the president could die, everybody else could have died too.”

President and Mrs. Moïse in 2019.Rebecca Blackwell/Associated Press

The men her husband had called for help, she said — the officials entrusted with his security — are now in Haitian custody.

And while she expressed satisfaction that a number of the accused conspirators have been detained, she is by no means satisfied. Mrs. Moïse wants international law enforcement agencies like the F.B.I., which searched homes in Florida this week as part of the investigation, to track the money that financed the killing. The Colombian mercenaries who were arrested, she said, did not come to Haiti to “play hide and seek,” and she wants to know who paid for it all. 

In a statement on Friday, the F.B.I. said it “remains committed to working alongside our international partners to administer justice.”

Mrs. Moïse expected the money to trace back to wealthy oligarchs in Haiti, whose livelihoods were disrupted by her husband’s attacks on their lucrative contracts, she said.

Mrs. Moïse cited a powerful Haitian businessman who has wanted to run for president, Reginald Boulos, as someone who had something to gain from her husband’s death, though she stopped short of accusing him of ordering the assassination.

Mr. Boulos and his businesses have been at the center of a barrage of legal cases brought by the Haitian government, which is investigating allegations of a preferential loan obtained from the state pension fund. Mr. Boulos’ bank accounts were frozen before Mr. Moïse’s death, and they were released to him immediately after he died, Mrs. Moïse said.

Police officials gather evidence around the presidential residence in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince. Joseph Odelyn/Associated Press

In an interview, Mr. Boulos said that only his personal accounts, with less than $30,000, had been blocked, and he stressed that a judge had ordered the release of the money this week, after he took the Haitian government to court. He insisted that, far from being involved in the killing, his political career was actually better off with Mr. Moïse alive — because denouncing the president was such a pivotal part of Mr. Boulos’s platform.

“I had absolutely, absolutely, absolutely nothing to do with his murder, even in dreams,” Mr. Boulos said. “I support a strong, independent international investigation to find who came up with the idea, who financed it and who executed it.”

Mrs. Moïse said she wants the killers to know she is not scared of them.

“I would like people who did this to be caught, otherwise they will kill every single president who takes power,” she said. “They did it once. They will do it again.”

She said she is seriously considering a run for the presidency, once she undergoes more surgeries on her wounded arm. She has already had two surgeries, and doctors now plan to implant nerves from her feet in her arm, she said. She may never regain use of her right arm, she said, and can move only two fingers.

“President Jovenel had a vision,” she said, “and we Haitians are not going to let that die.”

Protests and riots erupted the day before the president’s funeral.  Federico Rios for The New York Times

Anatoly Kurmanaev and Harold Isaac contributed reporting from Port-au-Prince.

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 29 juillet 2021

Jovenel Moïse funeral : Haiti president's hometown holds ceremony amid violence

Moise was assassinated at his home in Port-au-Prince on July 7

Edmund DeMarche

The body of slain Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was returned to his hometown Friday for a private funeral amid heavy security following violent protests and fears of political volatility in the Caribbean nation.

Martine Moïse arrived to cries of "Justice! Justice!" as she headed straight to her husband's casket, climbing the stairs and stopping in front of it. Her right arm in a sling, she lay her left arm on the casket and then brought it to her heart as she stood there in silence. Her eyes filled with tears as her three children joined her.

Minutes later, a group of supporters grabbed a large portrait of Moïse and paraded with it as the police band began to play the national anthem over loud wails.

As the ceremony began, hundreds of protesters clashed with police outside the private residence. Shots erupted and tear gas and black smoke wafted into the ceremony. Protesters' cries carried over religious leaders speaking at the funeral.

Earlier, cries of "Assassin!" filled the air at the arrival of Haiti's National Police Chief León Charles. Haitians clad in somber suits, shiny shoes and black and white formal dresses shouted and pointed fingers at the neighboring seating platforms where Haitian officials and foreign dignitaries sat above at least a dozen men with high-powered weapons.

"You didn’t take any measures to save Jovenel! You contributed to his killing!" one woman yelled.

On the grounds below, one Moïse supporter threatened Charles: "You need to leave now or we’re going to get you after the funeral!"

Newly appointed Prime Minister Ariel Henry arrived after to cries of, "Justice for Jovenel!"

White T-shirts and caps emblazoned with his picture were distributed to supporters the day before what is expected to be the final ceremony to honor Moïse, who was shot several times on July 7 during an attack at his private home that seriously injured his wife, Martine.

"This is something that will be engraved in our memory," said Pedro Guilloume, a Cap-Haitien resident who hoped to attend the funeral. "Let all Haitians channel solidarity."

Moïse’s body arrived shortly after dawn at his family’s seaside property where the funeral is being held. Six officials carried the brown casket up a stage where they saluted it and stood before it in silence for several minutes before draping a large red and blue Haitian flag over it.

Before the funeral began, a man wrapped himself in a large Haitian flag and approached the casket, crying out, "We need to fight and get justice for Jovenel!" Next to him, a man carrying a T-shirt commemorating Moïse joined in as he yelled, "Jovenel died big! He died for me and for the rest of the country…We’re not going to back down."

The funeral comes days after a new prime minister supported by key international diplomats was installed in Haiti — a move that appeared aimed at averting a leadership struggle following Moïse's assassination.

Henry, who was designated prime minister by Moïse before he was slain but never sworn in replaced interim prime minister Claude Joseph, and has promised to form a provisional consensus government until elections are held.

On Thursday, violent demonstrations hit neighborhoods in Cap-Haitien as groups of men fired shots into the air and blocked some roads with blazing tires. One heavily guarded police convoy carrying unknown officials drove through one flaming barricade, with a vehicle nearly flipping over.

A priest who presided over a Mass on Thursday morning at Cap-Haitian’s cathedral to honor Moïse warned there was too much bloodshed in Haiti as he asked people to find peace, noting that the poorest communities are affected.

On Thursday evening, Martine Moïse and her three children appeared at a small religious ceremony at a hotel in Cap-Haitien where Henry and other government officials offered their condolences.

"They took his life, but they can’t take his memories," said a priest who presided over the ceremony. "They can’t take his brain. They can’t take his ideas. We are Jovenel Moïse."

Moïse was sworn in as Haiti’s president in February 2017 and faced increasing criticism in recent years from those who accused him of becoming increasingly authoritarian. He had been ruling by decree for more than a year after the country failed to hold legislative elections.

Authorities have said that at least 26 suspects have been arrested in the killing, including 18 former Colombian soldiers. Police are still looking for several more suspects they say were involved in the assassination plot, including a former rebel leader and an ex-senator.

For about 10 minutes, Haitian President Jovenel Moïse attempted to call security forces to counter the early morning raid that unfolded at his home earlier this month before he was assassinated, according to a report.

SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (July 25th, 2021)
2 Kings 4, 42-44; Ps. 145; Eph. 4, 1-6; Jn. 6, 1-15. By +Guy Sansaricq

For the next four weeks we will be meditating prayerfully on Chapter 6 of St. John’s Gospel. The text begins with the stunning miracle of the multiplication of the loaves. Jesus feeds a multitude of five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fishes. That mighty deed is used to introduce Jesus’ fantastic teaching on the “BREAD OF LIFE.”

This miracle is to be seen in the light of two similar mighty deeds reported in the Old Testament: first, the manna in the desert and second, the feeding of 100 people by Prophet Elijah with a handful of barley. In both cases, God fed hungry crowds with very little.
The details reported by John bring forth great teachings:

1.  a)  Jesus does not create the food out of nothing but uses the little resources of the people. The little merchant boy had to give up his 5 loaves and 2 fishes with great trust in Jesus who appears to require FAITH before performing his mighty deed.

2.  b)  The Apostles are used to PUT ORDER in the crowd. The crowd that is being fed must not be in disarray. Likewise, The CHURCH must also be an organized body.

3.  c)  Also God’s gift is abundant. There were 12 baskets of leftovers.

4.  d)  After the miracle Jesus escapes from the crowd who wanted to make of Him their

KING. The do-gooders must not seek human honor nor political stature.

Man’s spirit needs to be fed just like his body. We are called to hunger for the bread of life.

*Announcement of Daniel Foote as Special Envoy for Haiti*

The Department of State is pleased to announce that Ambassador Daniel Foote, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, will serve as its Special Envoy for Haiti. The Special Envoy will engage with Haitian and international partners to facilitate long-term peace and stability and support efforts to hold free and fair presidential and legislative elections. He will also work with partners to coordinate assistance efforts in several areas, including humanitarian, security, and investigative assistance. Additionally, the Special Envoy will engage stakeholders in civil society and the private sector as we pursue Haitian-led solutions to the many pressing challenges facing Haiti.

The Special Envoy will, along with the U.S. Ambassador to Haiti, lead U.S. diplomatic efforts and coordinate the effort of U.S. federal agencies in Haiti from Washington, advise the Secretary and Acting Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, and coordinate closely with the National Security Council staff on the administration’s efforts to support the Haitian people and Haiti’s democratic institutions in the aftermath of the tragic assassination of Jovenel Moïse.

Special Envoy Foote brings extensive diplomatic experience to this role – including as Deputy Chief of Mission in Haiti and as the U.S. Ambassador to Zambia. The Department congratulates Special Envoy Foote as he takes on his new role and thanks him for his continued service to his country.

Battle for Power in Haiti Extends to Lobbying in Washington

Rival political figures and interests are doling out big sums to the influence industry to win support from the United States even as problems in Haiti remain unsolved.

July 21, 2021

The Haitian government had been ramping up its spending on Washington lobbying in the months before the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.Federico Rios for The New York Times

WASHINGTON — The struggle for power in Haiti after the assassination of the country’s president has spilled onto K Street, where rival Haitian politicians, business leaders and interest groups are turning to lobbyists to wage an expensive and escalating proxy battle for influence with the United States.

Documents, interviews and communications among Haitian politicians and officials show a scramble across a wide spectrum of Haitian interests to hire lobbyists and consultants in Washington and use those already on their payrolls in the hopes of winning American backing in a period of leadership turmoil in Haiti.

A group text chat in the days after the killing of President Jovenel Moïse that included Haitian officials, political figures and American lobbyists showed them strategizing about countering American critics and potential rivals for the presidency and looking for ways to cast blame for the killing, according to copies of the messages obtained by The New York Times and confirmed by some of the participants. The chat began before the assassination and originally included Mr. Moïse, though it appeared to take on a more frenetic tone after he was gunned down in his home this month.

The texts and other documents help bring to life how lobbyists from firms including Mercury Public Affairs — which was paid at least $285,000 in the second half of last year by the Haitian government — are working with allied politicians to position successors in the wake of the assassination.

In addition to Mercury, lobbying filings show that Haiti’s government is paying a total of $67,000 a month to three other lobbyists or their firms, some of which have retained additional lobbyists under subcontracts.

At the same time, competing political factions are looking for ways to develop backing in Washington for their own candidates. One former Haitian lawmaker had a series of discussions about hiring a lobbyist to push the United States to recognize Haiti’s Senate president as the country’s interim leader. A different would-be leader expanded the American political team he assembled to seek support in Congress and from wealthy donors for a possible presidential campaign.

Several other Haitian politicians and interest groups approached lobbyists, political consultants and fixers offering fees as high as $10 million or more for their help.

One prominent lobbyist, Robert Stryk, signed a contract in the days after the assassination to represent a prominent Haitian business interest.

Mr. Stryk — who has worked as a fixer of sorts for foreign clients from whom other lobbyists keep their distance, including targets of sanctions and criminal inquiries in Angola, the Democratic Republican of Congo and Venezuela — would not identify his client in Haiti. But he said he was helping the client attract private investment from the United States to Haiti in an effort to shape the debate about the country’s future.

“All of the various personalities are jockeying for position, in the hopes that the United States could elevate their stature in some way,” said Christopher Harvin, a former Bush administration official who works as a lobbyist and political consultant for clients around the world.

It is not clear yet how much effect the influence campaigns might have. But the lobbying push is the latest example of the scale and reach of Washington’s influence industry and its role in seeking to sway foreign policy. Especially in countries heavily reliant on the United States for financial aid and other backing, governments and deep-pocketed interests have long paid handsomely for help winning support in Washington — or at least the appearance of it — sometimes leading to criticism that they are more focused on currying favor in Washington than addressing problems at home.

The dynamic is stark in Haiti, where a quarter of the population is acutely hungry, despite billions in international assistance since an earthquake devastated the country in 2010.

The Haitian government had been ramping up its spending on Washington lobbying in the months before the assassination as Mr. Moïse faced mounting criticism over his efforts to write a new Constitution and hold elections while the country was convulsed by violence, with thousands of protesters demanding he leave office.

As members of Congress voiced criticism, a lobbyist for the Haitian government recommended in the group text chat days before the assassination that “we should make a formal request” for Haiti’s prime minister “to visit and meet with Blinken in DC,” referring to Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken.

The chaotic power struggle created by the killing of Mr. Moïse has only intensified the drive for United States government support.

Haiti’s president pleaded with top officer during raid: ‘Come save my life’

The suspected assassins were made up of Haitians, Haitian-Americans and former Colombian soldiers. The shooting occurred at Moïse's Port-au-Prince home on July 7.

The attack on the 53-year-old "was carried out by foreign mercenaries and professional killers — well-orchestrated," and that they were masquerading as agents of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Bocchit Edmond, the Haitian ambassador to the U.S., said.

The paper said it along with the McClatchy Washington Bureau spoke to "at least three people" who received calls from the president’s house on that morning. The paper said it is still a mystery how the team managed to get past several layers of security at the home.

None of the president’s security guards were hurt.

"When I send you to protect a president, I don’t send you to live, I send you to die protecting him," one member of the security detail told the paper.

So far, police have detained more than 20 suspects they say were directly involved in the killing, including a contingent of former Colombian special forces soldiers. Other suspects were killed by authorities as they closed in.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 20 juillet 2021

 Haiti faces uncertain future as mourning first lady returns

At the Toussaint Louverture International Airport, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday, July 17, 2021, Martine Moise, the wife of assassinated President Jovenel Moise, who was injured in the July 7 attack at their private home, returned to the Caribbean nation on Saturday following her release from a Miami hospital.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Haiti’s political future on Sunday grew murkier after the surprise return of first lady Martine Moïse, who was released from a hospital in Miami where she was treated for injuries following an attack in which the president was assassinated.

Martine Moïse did not make any public statements after she descended a private jet wearing a black dress, a black bulletproof vest, a black face mask and her right arm in a black sling as she mourned for President Jovenel Moïse, who was killed July 7 at their private home.

Some experts — like many in this country of more than 11 million people — were surprised at how quickly she reappeared in Haiti and questioned whether she plans to become involved in the country’s politics.

“The fact that she returned could suggest she intends to play some role,” said Laurent Dubois, a Haiti expert and Duke University professor. “She may intervene in one way or another.”

Martine Moïse arrived just hours after a prominent group of international diplomats issued a statement that appeared to shun interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, the man currently running the country with the backing of police and the military.

Joseph’s name was never mentioned in the statement made by the Core Group, composed of ambassadors from Germany, Brazil, Canada, Spain, the U.S., France, the European Union and representatives from the United Nations and the Organization of American States.

The group called for the creation of “a consensual and inclusive government,” adding, “To this end, it strongly encourages the designated Prime Minister Ariel Henry to continue the mission entrusted to him to form such a government.”

Henry was designated prime minister a day before Jovenel Moïse was killed. He did not respond to requests for comment.

The U.N., OAS and U.S. State Department did not offer further explanation when contacted.

Given the current state of Haitian politics, Dubois said he believes the arrival of Martine Moïse could have an impact.

“She’s obviously in a position to play a role ... given how wide open things are,” he said, adding that the Core Group’s statement is striking because it makes no reference to Joseph. “One has to wonder whether the developments in the investigation have anything to do with this. They’re all these puzzle pieces that are just changing moment to moment. Right now it seems very hard to figure out how to put these together.”

Authorities in Haiti and Colombia say at least 18 suspects directly linked to the killing have been arrested, the majority of them former Colombian soldiers. At least three suspects were killed and police say they are looking for numerous others. Colombian officials have said that the majority of former soldiers were duped and did not know of the assassination plot.

A day after the killing, U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price had said Joseph was the incumbent in the position and was serving as acting prime minister before the assassination: “We continue to work with Claude Joseph as such,” he said.

On July 11, a delegation of representatives from various U.S. agencies traveled to Haiti to review critical infrastructure, talk with Haitian National Police and meet with Joseph, Henry and Haitian Senate President Joseph Lambert in a joint meeting.

The deepening political turmoil has prompted dozens of Haitians to visit the U.S. embassy in Port-au-Prince in recent days to seek a visa or political asylum.

“We can’t stay anymore in the country,” said Jim Kenneth, a 19-year-old who would like to study medicine in the U.S. “We feel very insecure.”

WASHINGTON POST

U.S. Habit of Backing Strongman Allies Fed Turmoil in Haiti

Washington dismissed warnings that democracy was unraveling under President Jovenel Moïse, leaving a gaping leadership void after his assassination.

July 18, 202

Haiti’s President Is Assassinated

As protesters hurled rocks outside Haiti’s national palace and set fires on the streets to demand President Jovenel Moïse’s resignation, President Trump invited him to Mar-a-Lago in 2019, posing cheerfully with him in one of the club’s ornate entryways.

After members of Congress warned that Mr. Moïse’s “anti-democratic abuses” reminded them of the run-up to the dictatorship that terrorized Haiti in decades past, the Biden administration publicly threw its weight behind Mr. Moïse’s claim on power.

And when American officials urged the Biden administration to change course, alarmed that Haiti’s democratic institutions were being stripped away, they say their pleas went unheeded — and sometimes never earned a response at all.

Through Mr. Moïse’s time in office, the United States backed his increasingly autocratic rule, viewing it as the easiest way of maintaining stability in a troubled country that barely figured into the priorities of successive administrations in Washington, current and former officials say.

Even as Haiti spiraled into violence and political upheaval, they say, few in the Trump administration took seriously Mr. Moïse’s repeated warnings that he faced plots against his life. And as warnings of his authoritarianism intensified, the Biden administration kept up its public support for Mr. Moïse’s claim to power, even after Haiti’s Parliament emptied out in the absence of elections and Mr. Moïse ruled by decree.

When Mr. Moïse was assassinated this month, it left a gaping leadership void that set off a scramble for power with the few elected officials remaining. The United States, which has held enormous sway in Haiti since invading the countrymore than 100 years ago, was suddenly urged to send in troops and help fix the mess.

But in interviews with more than a dozen current and former officials, a common refrain emerged: Washington bore part of the blame, after brushing off or paying little attention to clear warnings that Haiti was lurching toward mayhem, and possibly making things worse by publicly supporting Mr. Moïse.

“It was predictable that something would happen,” said Senator Patrick Leahy, of Vermont. “The message that we send by standing alongside these people is that we think they are legitimate representatives of the Haitian people. They’re not.”

Critics say the American approach to Mr. Moïse followed a playbook the United States has used around the world for decades, often with major consequences for democracy and human rights: reflexively siding with or tolerating leaders accused of authoritarian rule because they advance American interests, or because officials fear instability in their absence.

Mr. Moïse’s grip on power tightened notably under Mr. Trump, who spoke admiringly of a range of foreign autocrats. Mr. Trump was also bent on keeping Haitian migrants out of the United States (they “all have AIDS,” American officials recounted him saying). To the extent that Trump officials focused on Haitian politics at all, officials say, it was mainly to enlist the country in Mr. Trump’s campaign to oust his nemesis in the region: Venezuela’s leader, Nicolás Maduro.

The Biden administration arrived in January consumed by the pandemic and a surge of migrants at the border with Mexico, leaving little bandwidth for the tumult convulsing Haiti, officials say. It publicly continued the Trump administration policy that Mr. Moïse was the legitimate leader, infuriating some members of Congress with a stance that one senior Biden official now calls a mistake.

“Moïse is pursuing an increasingly authoritarian course of action,” Rep. Gregory Meeks, now the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a joint statement with two other Democrats in late December, warning of a repeat of the “anti-democratic abuses the Haitian people have endured” in the past.

“We will not stand idly by while Haiti devolves into chaos,” they said.

In a February letter to Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, they and other lawmakers called on the United States to “unambiguously reject” the push by Mr. Moïse, who had already ruled by decree for a year, to stay in power. They urged the Biden administration to push for “a legitimate transitional government” to help Haitians determine their own future and emerge from “a cascade of economic, public health, and political crises.”

But Mr. Biden’s top adviser on Latin America, Juan Gonzalez, said that at the time, the administration did not want to appear to be dictating how the turmoil should be resolved.

“Tipping our finger on the scale in that way could send a country that was already in a very unstable situation into crisis,” Mr. Gonzalez said.

Past American political and military interventions into Haiti have done little to solve the country’s problems, and have sometimes created or aggravated them. “The solution to Haiti’s problems are not in Washington; they are in Port-au-Prince,” Haiti’s capital, Mr. Gonzalez said, so the Biden administration called for elections to take place before Mr. Moïse left office.

“The calculus we made was the best decision was to focus on elections to try to use that as a way to push for greater freedom,” he added.

In reality, critics say, the Biden administration was already tipping the scales by publicly supporting Mr. Moïse’s contention that he had another year in office, enabling him to preside over the drafting of a new Constitution that could significantly enhance the president’s powers.

Mr. Moïse was certainly not the first leader accused of autocracy to enjoy Washington’s backing; he was not even the first in Haiti. Two generations of brutal Haitian dictators from the Duvalier family were among a long list of strongmen around the Caribbean, Latin America, the Middle East and elsewhere who received resolute American support, particularly as allies against Communism.

“He may be a son of a bitch, but he is our son of a bitch,” President Franklin Delano Roosevelt supposedly said of one of them (though accounts vary about whether the president was referring to American-backed dictators in Nicaragua or in the Dominican Republic).

The debate has continued in both Democratic and Republican administrations about how hard to push authoritarian allies for democratic reforms. Once the threat of Communist expansionism faded, American administrations worried more about instability creating crises for the United States, like a surge of migrants streaming toward its shores or the rise of violent extremism.

Elliott Abrams, a foreign policy official in multiple Republican administrations and a special representative on Venezuela in the Trump administration, argued that Washington should support democracy when possible but sometimes has few alternatives to working with strongmen.

“In Haiti, no one has developed a good formula for building a stable democracy, and the U.S. has been trying since the Marines landed there a hundred years ago,” he said.

Early on in the Trump administration, Omarosa Manigault Newman, a former co-star on “The Apprentice” and new adviser to the president, began pressing Mr. Trump and his aides to engage with Haiti and support Mr. Moïse.

Officials were wary. Haiti supported Venezuela at two meetings of the Organization of American States in 2017, turning Mr. Moïse into what one official called an enemy of the United States and scuttling her efforts to arrange a state visit by him.

“I believed that a state visit between Mr. Trump and Mr. Moïse would have been a strong show of support for Haiti from the U.S. during a time of civil unrest,” Ms. Newman said, adding in a separate statement: “Jovenel was a dear friend and he was committed to being a change agent for his beloved Haiti.”

The episode underscored the degree to which some top Trump officials viewed Haiti as just a piece of its strategy toward Venezuela. And in the eyes of some lawmakers, Mr. Trump was not going to feel empathy for Haiti’s problems.

“We are all aware of his perception of the nation — in that he spoke about ‘s-hole’ countries,” said Rep. Yvette Clarke of New York, a co-chair of the House Haiti Caucus.

By 2019, nationwide protests grew violent in Haiti as demonstrators demanding Mr. Moïse’s ouster clashed with the police, burned cars and marched on the national palace. Gang activity became increasingly brazen, and kidnappings spiked to an average of four a week.

Mr. Trump and his aides showed few public signs of concern. In early 2019, Mr. Trump hosted Mr. Moïse at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of a meeting with Caribbean leaders who had lined up against Mr. Maduro of Venezuela.

By the next year, Mr. Moïse’s anti-democratic practices grew serious enough to command the attention of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who publicly warned Mr. Moïse against delaying parliamentary elections.

But beyond a few statements, the Trump administration did little to force the issue, officials said.

“No one did anything to address the underlying weaknesses, institutionally and democratically,” over the past several years, said Peter Mulrean, who served as the American ambassador to Haiti from 2015 to 2017. “And so we shouldn’t really be surprised that the lid blew off again.”

After Mr. Biden’s election, lawmakers and officials in Washington took up the issue with new urgency. Mr. Moïse, who came to office after a vote marred by low turnout and allegations of fraud, had been ruling by decree for a year because the terms of nearly all members of Parliament had expired and elections to replace them were never held.

Mr. Moïse won a five-year term in 2016, but did not take office until 2017 amid the allegations of fraud, so he argued that he should stay until 2022. Democracy advocates in Haiti and abroad cried foul, but on Feb. 5, the Biden administration weighed in, supporting Mr. Moïses’s claim to power for another year. And it was not alone: International bodies like the Organization of American States took the same position.

Mr. Blinken later criticized Mr. Moïse’s rule by decree and called for “genuinely free and fair elections this year.” But the Biden administration never withdrew its public position upholding Mr. Moïse’s claim to remain in office, a decision that Rep. Andy Levin, a co-chair of the House Haiti Caucus, blamed for helping him retain his grip on the country and continue its anti-democratic slide.

“It’s a tragedy that he was able to stay there,” Mr. Levin said.

The Biden administration has rebuffed calls by Haitian officials to send troops to help stabilize the country and prevent even more upheaval. A group of American officials recently visited to meet with various factions now vying for power and urge them “to come together, in a broad political dialogue,” Mr. Gonzalez said.

The Americans had planned to visit the port to assess its security needs, but decided against it after learning that gangs were occupying the area, blocking the delivery of fuel.

“How can we have elections in Haiti when gang members control 60 percent of the territory?” said Pierre Esperance, executive director of the Haitian National Human Rights Defense Network. “It will be gangs that organize the elections.”

David Kirkpatrick contributed reporting.

SIXTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME. (July 18, 2021)
Jer. 23, 1-6; Ps. 23; Eph. 2, 13-18; Mk. 6, 30-34 By +Guy Sansaricq

Today, Jesus is introduced to us as the GOOD SHEPHERD in fulfillment of the prophecies of Jeremiah. In the first reading, we hear God announcing that He would send in due time a good shepherd to teach and guide his chosen people. Jesus stands tall as the ONE who fulfills this prophecy through his teaching and mighty deeds.

We also see Jesus sending his Apostles to do the same, to preach and to heal and expel demons. Today, the Apostles are shown returning from their mission. They are exhausted. The mission is not easy. They had experienced rejection and even insults and persecutions. Jesus calls them to rest in a secluded place. Tired people do not function well. Rest like sleep is a necessity of life. Likewise, a good retreat renews our energy.

But as they try to withdraw from the crowd, the people described as being “like sheep without a shepherd” taking note of their escape followed them. Jesus, seeing the hunger of the people for a saving word, rejoiced and renouncing his project of a time of rest, began to TEACH them at length. What do we learn from these texts?

We must listen to the TEACHINGS of Jesus and not close our ears. We must SEEK understanding. We must encounter JESUS. We must eagerly embrace HIM like the crowds of old, as our SAVIOR, our SHEPHERD. We need to be set free of our demons and be healed! Let’s this hunger for Jesus’ gift of salvation inflame our hearts. Repentance is the first step!

*Former DEA informant, linked to Moïse investigation, turned to agency after assassination*

_BY MICHAEL WILNER,  JAY WEAVER,  KEVIN G. HALL, AND  JACQUELINE CHARLES_

_JULY 12, 2021 10:21 PM,  UPDATED 6 HOURS 17 MINUTES AGO_

A suspect in last week’s assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was once a confidential source for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, two agency officials told McClatchy late Monday.

The Miami Herald and the McClatchy Washington Bureau have learned that the suspect is Joseph Gertand Vincent, first arrested more than 20 years ago for filing false information on a U.S. passport application and who went on to become an occasional DEA informant.

Vincent, 55, was identified by Haitian authorities over the weekend as an arrested suspect along with another South Florida Haitian emigre named James Solages, 35, who until April was a maintenance director in a Lantana senior-living center. Both men told investigators they were hired as translators.

Information swirled for days, some of it first reported by the Miami Herald, about the DEA’s tie to Vincent, and late Monday the DEA confirmed only that a former informant was among the arrested in Haiti. The subject apparently reached out to the DEA following Moïse’s killing, alerting officials to his link and forcing the DEA to reveal one of its sources — an exceptional development.

A source close to Vincent, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the volatile situation in Haiti, which has asked for a U.S. troop presence, confirmed that the South Florida man was indeed once an informant for the DEA. Another news source, also demanding anonymity, said Vincent went by the pseudonym Oliver.

Agency officials would not confirm the identity of the source that they were acknowledging in unusual fashion.

“At times, one of the suspects in the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was a confidential source to the DEA,” one DEA official said. “Following the assassination of President Moïse, the suspect reached out to his contacts at the DEA.

“A DEA official assigned to Haiti urged the suspect to surrender to local authorities and, along with a U.S. State Department colleague, shared information with the Haitian government that assisted in the surrender and arrest of the suspect and one other individual.”

The DEA announcement is even more stunning because of reports in Haiti that the attackers who killed the president shouted through a loudspeaker that a DEA raid was taking place. The DEA steadfastly denies any knowledge of or involvement in the monumental events that unfolded in impoverished Haiti.

“DEA is aware of reports that President Moïse’s assassins yelled ‘DEA’ at the time of their attack. These individuals were not acting on behalf of DEA,” said the source.

Interim Haitian Police Chief Léon Charles said Sunday that among the items police found in the home of Christian Emmanueal Sanon, an alleged mastermind of the plot, was a hat with DEA written on it and a cache of arms and ammunition.

Sanon is a medical doctor who had worked in the Boynton Beach area. He appears in numerous online videos criticizing the Haitian government. Officials in Haiti allege Sanon hoped to be installed as president of Haiti in the aftermath of the assassination. Solages and Vincent both have said they were not part of any mission to kill the president.

The Justice Department on Monday night issued a statement saying the agency’s initial assessment of the assassination has been completed.

“An initial assessment has been conducted in Haiti by senior U.S. officials. The department will continue to support the Haitian government in its review of the facts and circumstances surrounding this heinous attack,” said Anthony Coley, a DOJ spokesman. “The department will also investigate whether there were any violations of U.S. criminal law in connection with this matter.”

None of the three South Florida suspects appear to have been assigned a lawyer yet, and they have not been made available for interviews. Their version of events, or those offered by the Haitian government cannot be independently confirmed.

The source close to Vincent said the West Palm Beach man worked as a paid informant who helped the DEA facilitate the arrests of drug-trafficking targets, including the infamous Guy Philippe in early 2017.

Philippe, who had been wanted for more than a decade in the United States, was arrested in January 2017 in Haiti. Federal DEA agents brought Philippe, then 48, on a plane to Miami. A source familiar with that operation confirmed that Joseph Vincent was with the Haitian National Police officers when they turned over Philippe to DEA agents for the flight to Miami.

The ex-rebel leader, charged with drug trafficking by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami under a 2005 sealed indictment, had just been elected to a six-year term in the Haitian parliament as a senator from the Grand’Anse area of Haiti.

His arrest came four days before newly elected lawmakers were set to be sworn in. As a senator, Philippe would have been entitled to immunity from arrest or prosecution during his term in office.

Once in custody, Philippe tried to have his indictment dismissed on the basis of his immunity — to no avail. He eventually pleaded guilty to the drug-trafficking conspiracy charges and was sentenced to nine years in prison.

Philippe’s leadership in a 2004 coup d’état against then-President Jean Bertrand Aristide led to the president’s ouster, and Human Rights Watch accused him of overseeing unlawful killings. In the aftermath, Philippe — along with other Haitian police officers, politicians and drug traffickers — became entangled in the U.S. crackdown on Haiti as a narcotics hub for Colombian cocaine.

Almost two dozen Haitian suspects, including the deposed president’s security guard, were convicted by federal prosecutors in Miami.

After the guard’s conviction in 2005, he played a pivotal role as a cooperating witness, including in the investigation of Aristide himself, though the former president was never charged. The guard, Oriel Jean, was assassinated in 2015 after returning to Haiti.