Haiti police say president's killers were Colombian and US citizens
Members of hit squad arrested at Taiwanese embassy while eight are still on the run
Suspects in the assassination of Haiti's President Jovenel Moise lie on the floor at police headquarters in Port-au-Prince after their arrest on July 8. AP Photo
AFP
Port-au-Prince
Jul 9, 2021
A 28-member hit squad of Americans and Colombians assassinated Haiti's President Jovenel Moise, police say, adding that eight are still at large.
One day after Moise was killed and his wife Martine wounded by gunmen in their Port-au-Prince home, the poorest country in the Americas has no president or working parliament and two men claiming to be in charge as prime minister.
Police paraded some of the suspects before the media on Thursday, along with Colombian passports and weapons they had seized. The head of the Haiti's National Police, Leon Charles, vowed to track the other eight down.
"It was a team of 28 assailants, 26 of whom were Colombian, who carried out the operation to assassinate the president," Mr Charles said.
"We have arrested 15 Colombians and the two Americans of Haitian origin. Three Colombians have been killed while eight others are on the loose."
Authorities said earlier that four of the suspects had been killed. Mr Charles did not explain the discrepancy.
More:
https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/2021/07/09/haiti-police-say-presidents-killers-were-colombian-and-us-citizens/
Also posted in LBN:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142767171
= new reply since forum marked as read
They often head for South Florida, and I've read there's a large community around Miami called "Little Haiti."
There are also Haitian former police who were enlisted by US right-wing Presidents (both Bushes) to move against Aristide both times he was removed from office by violent thugs recruited for the purpose. You may recall the elder Duvalier, "Papa Doc", had a mob of monsters called the Tonton Macoute which was used to keep the popuation living in abject terror.
Wikipedia:
The Tonton Macoute (Haitian Creole: Tonton Makout)[1][2][3] or simply the Macoute[4][5] was a special operations unit within the Haitian paramilitary force created in 1959 by dictator François "Papa Doc" Duvalier. In 1970 the militia was renamed the Volontaires de la Sécurité Nationale (VSN, Volunteers of the National Security).[6] Haitians named this force after the Haitian mythological bogeyman, Tonton Macoute ("Uncle Gunnysack" ), who kidnaps and punishes unruly children by snaring them in a gunny sack (French: macoute) and carrying them off to be consumed at breakfast.[7][8]
History
Papa Doc Duvalier created the Tontons Macoutes because he perceived the military to be a threat to his power.
After the July 1958 Haitian coup d'état attempt against President François Duvalier, he purged the army and law enforcement agencies in Haiti and executed numerous officers as he perceived them as a threat to his regime. To counteract this threat, he created a military force that bore several names. In 1959, his paramilitary force was called the Cagoulards ("Hooded Men" ).[9][10] They were then renamed to Milice Civile (Civilian Militia), and after 1962, Volontaires de la Sécurité Nationale (Volunteers of the National Security, or VSN).[9][11] They began to be called the Tonton Macoute when people started to disappear for no apparent reason.[12] This group answered to him only.
Duvalier authorized the Tontons Macoutes to commit systematic violence and human rights abuses to suppress political opposition. They were responsible for unknown numbers of murders and rapes in Haiti. Political opponents often disappeared overnight, or were sometimes attacked in broad daylight. Tontons Macoutes stoned and burned people alive. Many times they put the corpses of their victims on display, often hung in trees for everyone to see and take as warnings against opposition. Family members who tried to remove the bodies for proper burial often disappeared themselves. Anyone who challenged the VSN risked assassination. Their unrestrained state terrorism was accompanied by corruption, extortion and personal aggrandizement among the leadership. The victims of Tontons Macoutes could range from a woman in the poorest of neighborhoods who had previously supported an opposing politician to a businessman who refused to comply with extortion threats (ostensibly as donations for public works, but which were in fact the source of profit for corrupt officials and even President Duvalier). The Tontons Macoutes murdered between 30,000 and 60,000 Haitians.[13]
Luckner Cambronne led the Tontons Macoute throughout the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s. His cruelty earned him the nickname "Vampire of the Caribbean". This particular name was earned by one of his endeavors of extorting plasma from locals for sale. Luckner did this through his company "Hemocaribian" and shipped five tons of plasma per month to US Labs. He would also go on to sell cadavers to medical schools after buying them from Haitian hospitals for $3 per corpse. When the Hospital could not supply this the local funeral homes would be used.[14] In 1971, President Duvalier died and his widow Simone, and son Jean-Claude Duvalier ordered Cambronne into exile. Cambronne moved to Miami, Florida, USA, where he lived until his death in 2006.[15]
. . .
The Tonton Macoutes remained active even after the presidency of "Papa Doc" Duvalier's son "Baby Doc" ended with the anti-Duvalier protest movement 1986.[20] Massacres led by paramilitary groups spawned from the Macoutes continued during the following decade. The most feared paramilitary group during the 1990s was the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haïti (FRAPH), which Toronto Star journalist Linda Diebel described as modern Tonton Macoutes, and not the legitimate political party they claimed to be.[6]000
Led by Emmanual Constant, FRAPH differed from the Tonton Macoute in their denial to submit to the will of a single authority and their cooperation with regular military forces.[24] FRAPH extended its reach far outside that of the Haitian state and had offices present in New York, Montreal and Miami until its disarmament and disbandment in 1994.[25]
More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonton_Macoute
~ ~ ~
Emmanuel Constant (nicknamed "Toto", born on October 27, 1956) is the founder of FRAPH, a Haitian death squad that terrorised supporters of exiled president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
. . .
1991–1994
In mid-1993, two years after the 1991 Haitian coup d'état, Constant set up paramilitary group known as the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haïti (FRAPH) to terrorize supporters of exiled president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.[1] A CIA source implicated Constant in the 1993 assassination of Justice Minister Guy Malary, although the agency said the source was "untested".[5]
Constant was paid by the CIA from 1992 to 1994, as were several leading members of the military junta. He provided information to the agency for about $500 a month, according to United States officials and Mr. Constant himself.[5]
More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmanuel_Constant
~ ~ ~
Haiti death squad leader Emmanuel ‘Toto’ Constant’s deportation to Haiti is back on
BY THE HAITIAN TIMES
MAY. 21, 2020
Emmanuel “Toto” Constant, a former strongman who once boasted
that Vodou and the CIA shielded him from trouble, gestures during a
press conference in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in this Sept. 22, 1994, photo.
. . .
A close friend of Raoul Cedras, the Haitian army general who led the 1991 coup against a newly elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Constant founded the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti while on the CIA’s payroll. The force, known by the acronym FRAPH, has been linked to the murders of at least 3,000 Aristide militants, previous Haitian authorities have said.
https://www.miamiherald.com/article242866031.html
~ ~ ~
An associate of Constant, Guy Philippe:
Guy Philippe (born 29 February 1968) is a convicted drug smuggler serving time in US federal prison. He had gained power in Haiti as a paramilitary leader, and had participated in the electoral process to become a political leader. He led the 2000-2004 paramilitary insurgency that culminated in the 2004 Haitian coup d'état ousting of Haiti's elected government and President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
Philippe was a presidential candidate in the 2006 Haitian general election, receiving nearly 4% of the vote. On 21 June 2017, he was given a nine-year sentence by the United States federal government for taking bribes from drug smugglers. The court case did not try Philippe for any of the numerous deaths that were documented as being carried out by death squads that he led between 2000 and 2004.[1]
Career
Philippe accepted a commission as a commander in the Haitian National Police, and then became the police chief of the Port-au-Prince suburb of Delmas from 1997 to 1999. International monitors later "learned that dozens of suspected gang members were summarily executed, mainly by police under the command of Inspector Berthony Bazile, Philippe's deputy."[2][6] In 1999 he was made police chief of Cap-Haïtien.
2000s
On 15 January 2000, Guy Philippe and his wife had a daughter named Aïsha. Following October 2000 accusations of participation in a coup plot and his subsequent removal from his post as police chief of Cap-Haïtien, Philippe fled to the Dominican Republic. While there he recruited ex-military and others forming a paramilitary organization,[7] which was alleged to have received training from the U.S. Government.[8][verify][9][dead link][unreliable source?][10][unreliable source?] The Haitian government accused Philippe of masterminding a deadly attack on the Police Academy in July 2001 and of an attempted coup in December 2001.[2] In July 2003, witnesses place him, together with Voltaire Jean-Batiste, leading a death squad operating in eastern Haiti just across the Dominican border.[11]
In February 2004, he returned from the Dominican Republic with his paramilitary group to join the 2004 Haitian coup d'état against president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Five days after crossing back into Haiti and joining former militia leader Louis-Jodel Chamblain in announcing his support for anti-government forces, Philippe was given command of the rebel army. On 2 March 2004, Philippe and his paramilitaries retook control of the former Haitian Army headquarters across from the National Palace. Philippe declared to the international press that he himself was now in control of 90% of Haïti's armed forces. In an address on Haitian Radio, Philippe declared, "The country is in my hands."[12] He summoned twenty police commanders to meet with him the previous day and warned that if they failed to appear he would arrest them.[13]
That same day, Philippe announced he would arrest Haitian Prime Minister Yvon Neptune, who is a top official of Aristide's Lavalas party. As published at the time by Democracy Now!, quoting sources in Haïti: "Neptune's home was burned and looted and that he was being pursued by armed gangs. People close to Neptune reported that he fears for his life. Local radio reported that Neptune was evacuated from his office by helicopter as Guy Philippe led a mob in a march to the office. Meanwhile, there are reports of regular execution-style killings on the Haitian seaside.[12]".
More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Philippe
~ ~ ~
Guy Philippe, with some of his men. He was outfitted and financed with US funds next door in the Dominican Republic by George W Bush, and came across when the time was "appropriate" to slaughter Haitians, terrorize the countryside, take over the country, and start Former paramilitary leader Guy Philippe will be going to jail for money laundering in connection with drug trafficking. But his more serious crimes were murdering Haitians and Haitian democracy as the leader of the “armed opposition” during the Feb. 29, 2004 coup d’état against former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
In the early 1990s, Emmanuel “Toto” Constant headed another anti-Aristide paramilitary organization known as the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti (FRAPH), which played a large role in killing an estimated 5,000 during the 1991-1994 coup d’état.
Like Philippe, Constant was never tried for his crimes against humanity. Instead, in 1996, the Clinton administration gave him de facto political asylum in the United States. However, in 2008, he was convicted in New York of mortgage fraud and is currently serving a 12-37 year prison sentence.
If he had gone to trial in May and been convicted, Philippe faced a life term for drug trafficking. Instead, he struck a plea deal with federal prosecutors whereby he will likely serve only 7.5 to 9 years in jail.
Although serving terms for lesser offenses, Constant and Philippe are both part of a murderous paramilitary continuum in Haiti that can be traced from François “Papa Doc” Duvalier’s Volunteers for National Security (VSN), commonly known as the Tonton Macoutes, to the death-squads that continue kidnapping and murder in Haiti today.making his way to progressive President Artistide's residence. Bush's government gave Aristide the choice of leaving Haiti on an airplane and being dumped in South Africa, or staying in Haiti, where he would be murdered.
The Real Crimes of Guy Philippe
Selections from “Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in Haiti” (Part 1 of 3)
Jeb Sprague - May 3, 2017 010466
Former paramilitary leader Guy Philippe will be going to jail for money laundering in connection with drug trafficking. But his more serious crimes were murdering Haitians and Haitian democracy as the leader of the “armed opposition” during the Feb. 29, 2004 coup d’état against former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
In the early 1990s, Emmanuel “Toto” Constant headed another anti-Aristide paramilitary organization known as the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti (FRAPH), which played a large role in killing an estimated 5,000 during the 1991-1994 coup d’état.
Like Philippe, Constant was never tried for his crimes against humanity. Instead, in 1996, the Clinton administration gave him de facto political asylum in the United States. However, in 2008, he was convicted in New York of mortgage fraud and is currently serving a 12-37 year prison sentence.
If he had gone to trial in May and been convicted, Philippe faced a life term for drug trafficking. Instead, he struck a plea deal with federal prosecutors whereby he will likely serve only 7.5 to 9 years in jail.
Although serving terms for lesser offenses, Constant and Philippe are both part of a murderous paramilitary continuum in Haiti that can be traced from François “Papa Doc” Duvalier’s Volunteers for National Security (VSN), commonly known as the Tonton Macoutes, to the death-squads that continue kidnapping and murder in Haiti today.
More:
https://haitiliberte.com/the-real-crimes-of-guy-philippe/
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I absolutely believe any Colombian "former military" figures (Colombia's military is intensely right-wing, and has interacted with the paramilitary AUC (death squads) in massacres of villages of people they "suspect of support of guerrilas" ) work as paramilitaries now, the AUC having split into smaller, new groups, like the "Aguillas Negras" and those groups continue the terrorism, social cleansing, narcotrafficking, etc. conducted under the AUC umbrella. This assassination was no doubt planned before Biden took office, as was the attempted invasion by former US militaries of Venezuela, which the corporate media has barely mentioned.
There are quite a few Latin American and Caribbean presidents who've bought the farm during our lifetimes. A lot of covert planning has gone into these "mysterious" endeavors.
The police chief said eight more suspects were being sought
By PTI
July 09, 2021 12:15 IST
Suspects in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, who was shot dead early Wednesday at his home, are
shown to the media in Port-au-Prince, Haiti | Reuters
Seventeen suspects have been detained so far in the stunning assassination of Haiti's president, and Haitian authorities say two are believed to hold dual US-Haitian citizenship and Colombia's government says at least six are former members of its army.
Lon Charles, chief of Haiti's National Police, said Thursday night that 15 of the detainees were from Colombia.
The police chief said eight more suspects were being sought and three others had been killed by police. Charles had earlier said seven were killed.
"We are going to bring them to justice," the police chief said, the 17 handcuffed suspects sitting on the floor during a news conference on developments following the brazen killing of President Jovenel Mose at his home before dawn Wednesday.
Colombia's government said it had been asked about six of the suspects in Haiti, including two of those killed, and had determined they were retired members of its army. It didn't release their identities.
More:
https://www.theweek.in/news/world/2021/07/09/two-us-men-ex-colombia-soldiers-held-in-haiti-presidents-assassination.html
