IMF Chief Strauss-Kahn Would not Spare the Dollar

IMF Managing Director at UN International Donors Conference
SIMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn (r), and President of the Republic of Haiti H.E. René Garcia Préval (l) prior to a bi-lateral meeting between Strauss-Kahn and Préval during the “International Donors’ Conference Towards a New Future for Haiti” at the United Nations in New York on March 31, 2010
IMF Staff Photographer/Michael Spilotro

Dominique Strauss-Kahn has resigned from the International Monetary Fund. Today he was granted bail and faces sexual assault charges involving housekeeper at the Sofitel Hotel in Manhattan.

The whole situation must be very surreal to him, given that, as recently as a month ago, on April 28, a French daily newspaper, Liberation, published an off-the-record comment by Mr. Strauss-Kahn described as voicing the fear that "political opponent would pay a woman more than $1m to allege rape"

DSK has said through his lawyer that there was no rape. He has pled not guilty and asserts that the sexual encounter was consensual.

Innocent until proven guilty. Critical thinking says we must question the evidence against Strauss-Kahn. After all, it is the job of the prosecution to prove its case. "Neither we nor anyone else—outside the accused and the accuser (and, perhaps, other interested and unnamed parties)—know exactly what went on in Strauss-Kahn’s suite at the Sofitel Hotel in Manhattan on Sunday. Whatever information the public possesses has emerged courtesy of the New York City Police Department, the alleged victim’s lawyer, and the mass media. None of these can be considered reliable sources."

Rape is a crime of control and violence. Strauss-Kahn was known as a seducer of women. Up to this point, he had never been accused of violently assaulting a woman who became the focus of his attentions, although since the attempted rape allegations, a woman has come forward to say that five years ago Strauss-Kahn acted like a "rutting chimpanzee."

Retired criminal defense attorney John Reed lays out a case for the defense of Strauss-Kahn:

"...first of all apply the Constitutional standard that Strauss-Kahn is innocent until proved guilty, and therefore, we must look with suspicion upon the facts asserted by the state at this point, including the alleged statement of the victim.

There are some very large red flags in this case, and if I had to choose right now whether I would rather prosecute this case or defend it, I would choose to defend it. I think it will be hard to prosecute.

First, my guess is that standard operating procedure in this hotel, like others, is for the maids to prop the door open with their cleaning cart as they work the room. So the defendant's prints better be on the handles of that cart since he had to remove it from propping open the door before he could commence the attack, and he had to do this without the maid seeing him.

Second, I would hire an expert to test the sound proofing of the room, and use an investigator to determine where the other maids and guests were are at the time of the assault. For if she did not scream when she could have been heard, then a reasonable doubt about a set up might arise.

Third, maids usually work in groups of two, and I would determine whether this was the normal procedure at the hotel in question, and why, if so, the procedure was not followed this particular morning. Fourth, hotel maids always determine whether a guest is in the room, including the bathroom, before they begin cleaning the room. They also make sure the guest has checked out. Neither was done in this case. Why? This kind of mistake does not happen in a $200 a day Hilton, let alone a room costing in thousands.

Fifth, why, considering that the rape shield law is preventing the release of victim's name, is the state keeping the alleged victim incommunicado, not even allowed to visit with her daughter, according to her attorney?

Sixth, why was the defendant not provided bail? He is one of the most famous men in the world. Certainly bail could be set high enough to insure his return. Moreover, the state would know his location despite the fact he travels internationally with frequency. If he failed to appear, he would not only look guilty, but he would simply be extradited eventually, and lose his bail money. [Bail was granted as of 5.91.11.]

While there's plenty of reasons to question the case against Mr. Strauss-Kahn, we must also look at the motive that "interested and unnamed parties" might have in railroading him.

According to an economics expert interviewed on Russia Today, Strauss-Kahn was a vocal advocate of widening the world money system and drawing the world away from the dollar as a reserve currency.

Adrian Salbuchi, is an economics and geopolitics author in Buenos Aires. Mr. Salbuchi interprets the dramatic circumstances surrounding the former IMF boss' resignation as a sign "that the powers that be were not very happy with him."

Russia Today is not the only alternate news source to smell something fishy about Strauss-Kahn's spectacular arrest. To many it's not making a lot of sense and the timing is really suspicious.

The UK Telegraph broke the scoop. Dominique Strauss-Kahn was mounting an attack against the dollar:

So, Strauss-Kahn finds himself in the same crowd as Saddam Hussein and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, right? You may recall that Saddam switched from dollars to euros about a year before the war. Twelve months later Iraq was invaded, Saddam was hanged, and the dollar was restored to power. Gaddafi made a similar mistake when "he initiated a movement to refuse the dollar and the euro, and called on Arab and African nations to use a new currency instead, the gold dinar." ("Libya: All About Oil, or All About Central Banking?" Ellen Brown, Op-Ed News) Libya has since come under attack by US and NATO forces which have armed a motley group of dissidents, malcontents and terrorists to depose Gaddafi and reimpose dollar hegemony.

To sum up the motives for the arrest:

1. Mr. Strauss-Kahn angered a lot of the big-money guys because he was a vocal advocate for drawing the world away from the dollar as a reserve currency.


2. DSK was planning to institute reforms at the IMF:
   

   Strauss-Kahn had set out on a "kinder and gentler" path, one that would not force foreign leaders to privatize their state-owned industries or crush their labor unions. Naturally, his actions were not warmly received by the bankers and corporatists who look to the IMF to provide legitimacy to their ongoing plunder of the rest of the world. These are the people who think that the current policies are "just fine" because they produce the results they're looking for, which is bigger profits for themselves and deeper poverty for everyone else."

3. The IMF issued a surprising report in 2009 – two years into Strauss-Kahn's tenure, which placed the blame for the global economic crisis on U.S. mortgage companies and financial industry associations. Read an evaluation of the report here.


4. In an interview with the French daily newspaper Liberation, Strauss-Kahn voiced the off-the-record fear, published as recently as a month ago, in April 28th, that this very situation might be engineered: "IMF chief 'feared political opponent would pay a woman more than $1m to allege rape"

   Michelle Sabban, a senior councillor for the greater Paris region and a Strauss-Kahn loyalist said: ‘I am convinced it is an international conspiracy.’

   She added: ‘It's the IMF they wanted to decapitate, not so much the Socialist primary candidate.

5. The IMF chief was ahead of Nicolas Sarkozy in the race. Sarkozy had a number of personal scandals and plummeting approval ratings. Strauss-Kahn was favored to be the next President of France.


6. The fact that Strauss-Kahn is a member of the French Socialist party cannot be ruled out of the equation, given the stigma attached to anyone labeled with having a "Socialist agenda" – as is erroneously the case with detractors of U.S. President Barack Obama.
   
   
   The Daily Mail reports that, "the first person to break the news of Strauss-Kahn's arrest was an activist in Mr Sarkozy's UMP party -- who apparently knew about the scandal before it happened. Jonathan Pinet, a politics student, tweeted the news just before the New York Police Department made it public, although he said that he simply had a 'friend' working at the Sofitel where the attack was said to have happened." Also, "The first person to re-tweet Mr Pinet was Arnaud Dassier, a spin doctor who had previously publicized details of multi-millionaire Strauss-Kahn's luxurious lifestyle in a bid to dent his left wing credentials."

The purported facts of the case as released by the police are suspicious. In the hands of a competent criminal defense lawyer who can punch wholes into the incredible story, Mr. Strauss-Kahn will likely be acquitted. Strauss-Kahn's attorney Benjamin Brafman, who has defended other high-profile clients, including Michael Jackson, is no slouch.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn was probably taken down because he advocated real change to a monetary system which is rotten to a the core. In this "new world order," failure is rewarded, up is down, down is up and we the people are always the ones who get screwed.

Therefore, his political career is affectively over before it began. He has lost his power, influence, reputation and sadly his freedom. To further prejudice the public, a rumor has been circulated that he is on suicide watch. No fear of him being offed while in jail, though. The ends have been achieved. Like they were with the jailing of Haiti's Father Gerard Jean-Juste, Yvon Neptune and other political prisoners globally who are deemed to pose a threat to those in power.

The IMF's first deputy managing director John Lipsky has stepped in as acting managing director of the global institution in the interim. When a new IMF chief is selected, that next individual will have great motivation for toeing the line and keeping the dollar king.

UPDATE 05.27.2011
Replacing Strauss-Kahn; "Pro-bank bailout" Lagarde is a shoo in by Mike Whitney

"Lagarde supports weaker regulations so that banks and other financial institutions can continue to rake in windfall profits while increasing the risks to the broader economy. She just announced her candidacy this morning (May 25), but already she's won the approval of Washington, Wall Street, the big banks, and the EU heads of state. She's a shoo."

"But Lagarde has not moved to the head of the pack due to her anti-worker bias alone, but because she's a trusted insider who will implement the IMF's privatization and structural adjustment programs without challenging their merit.

Strauss-Kahn's promises of "reform" at the fund were a constant source of anxiety for big finance. Lagarde won't make that same mistake. She won't go off the reservation, consort with progressives like Joseph Stiglitz, or veer from her script. Here's how The Guardian summed up Lagarde's impressive resume:

"Christine Lagarde stands for protecting big banks.....she's the most pro-bank bailout of the lot.

"The Americans are going to try and put in [White House adviser] David Lipton as number two. Lipton is Mr Bank Bailout. He worked for Citigroup. If they put in Lagarde and Lipton, what does that say? We are going with the total bank protection plan. That would be a disaster."

[...] So the belt-tightening will intensify under Lagarde, which is a signal to bankers that she can be trusted to protect their interests, and all the talk about "soft restructuring" or reforms a la Strauss-Kahn will end.

There will be no more talk about replacing the dollar with SDRs (Special Drawing Rights) either. Lagarde is not going to rock the boat. The only reforms she'll be working on are "labor reforms", a familiar buzzword among the financial elite for union busting.

[...] So, it looks like Wall Street may have found their replacement for the mercurial Strauss Kahn. There won't be any debt-restructuring, bondholders will be paid in full, and the dollar's dominant role as the world's reserve currency will go unchallenged."

Background:

• International Monetary Fund director Dominique Strauss-Kahn calls for new world currency | By Andrew Trotman


• Dominique Strauss-Kahn was trying to torpedo the dollar | By Mike Whitney


• The Amerikan Police State Strides Forward by Paul Craig Roberts


• The serious questions raised by the Dominique Strauss-Kahn affair by David North and David Walsh


• IMF chief Strauss-Kahn caught in "Honey Trap" by Mike Whitney


• Why We Need a "Marshall Plan" for Haiti by Dominique Strauss-Kahn

Haiti Security Hype Hampers Aid & IMF Says $100 Mil Grant Not Loan

Port-au-Prince, 18 Jan 2010 – Cecile Modvar of Unicef speaks with children living in a tent camp in a public square. This makeshift tent was set up on the place du Canapé Vert.

Talk about shock and awe. In what is being termed a "breakthrough," yesterday, the IMF announced that Haiti would not be forced to take a loan out for rebuilding. The new $100 million dollar debt the IMF gave to Haiti for reconstruction will be canceled.

Haiti is still grappling with loans that it will realistically never be able to pay back in light of the catastrophic earthquake of January 12, 2009. However, a group of countries called the Paris Club (Interesting name. Wonder why they chose that? Oh, right, they meet each month in Paris), namely, Canada, France, Italy and the United States, have urged Haiti's creditors to cancel the debt.

"The Paris Club said that last July its members canceled all their claims on Haiti, at that time totaling $214 million."“Considering the financing needs that Haiti will face in reconstructing the country, Paris Club creditors call upon other bilateral creditors also to urgently provide full debt cancellation to Haiti,”

In the same NY Times article quoted above, there was a very disturbing quote from Greg Barrows a spokesman for the World Food Program, explaining why aid has been hampered from getting to Haitians in need:

He said diesel fuel was being shipped in from neighboring Dominican Republic by road and the convoys required a security escort.

Because of the lack of security in Port-au-Prince, he said, “we had to scale back some distributions, not because we weren’t able to reach the people but because we didn’t have security.”

Conversely, folks on the ground are reporting that they have not witnessed any undue cause for concern over security issues.

Since we arrived in Port au Prince everyone has told us that you cannot go into the area around the palace because of violence and insecurity. I was in awe as we walked into downtown, among the flattened buildings, in the shadow of the fallen palace, amongst the swarms of displaced people there was calm and solidarity. We wound our way through the camp asking for injured people who needed to get to the hospital. Despite everyone telling us that as soon as we did this we would be mobbed by people, I was amazed as we approached each tent people gently pointed us towards their neighbors, guiding us to those who were suffering the most.

Also, from the UK Independent, Andy Kershaw: Stop treating these people like savages:

(The runways, incidentally, at this allegedly grid-locked airport were, during Snow's broadcasts, disturbed by just one aircraft. The US military, now running the control tower, says there is no room to park more planes. Over Snow's shoulder, one could see acre upon acre of empty airport outfield.)

The alarmingly unanimous priorities of the spokesmen and women of aid organisations and the military, have been with "issues" (for they love that word) of "security", "procedures", and "logistics" (what we used to call "transport" or "trucks"). These obsessions indicate not only a self-serving and self-important careerist culture among some, though not all, aid workers (although wide experience of the profession in Haiti and across Africa tells me it is more common than donors would like to think), but that the magnitude of the crisis has paralysed them into a gibbering strike force of box-tickers. Most worryingly, it reveals that many – even selfless – NGO workers on the ground haven't a clue about the country and its people.

There has now solidified a consensus among aid organisations that the relief they are bringing is itself a liability; that distributing what Haitians are dying for – literally – will bring on a second nightmare. So, supplies pile up at the airport because, apparently, the Haitians need to be fed and watered at gunpoint. And there aren't enough men with guns to provide this totemic "security" and there aren't enough trucks to move the supplies around the country. (Haiti is always absolutely full of trucks. The first relief priority ought to be fuel for those convoys, to deliver the water, medicines and food. In that order).

It is very good that Haiti is getting unprecedented support, but it is very sad that the people are dying for lack of medical help in great numbers. The death toll after the quake may exceed the death toll from the earthquake itself.

Fortunately there is a light at the end of the tunnel for Haiti. After pressure from around the globe, the IMF announced yesterday that it will not be lending $100 million to Haiti for reconstruction. The IMF is making the $100 mil. a grant to Haiti.

In June 2009, the World Bank, IMF, and IDB canceled $1.2 billion of Haiti's debt. This amounted to a huge portion of Haiti's debt, but Haiti still owed about $891 million dollars. Most of the debt is owed to the IDB ($429 million), IMF ($165 million) and the World Bank ($38 million).

The head of the IMF Dominique Strauss-Kahn was interviewed in Hong Kong for his reaction to the catastrophe.

“My belief is that Haiti— which has been incredibly hit by different things—the food and fuel prices crisis, then the hurricane, then the earthquake—needs something that is big. Not only a piecemeal approach, but something which is much bigger to deal with the reconstruction of the country: some kind of a Marshall Plan that we need now to implement for Haiti.

...“The most important thing is that the IMF is now working with all donors to try to delete all the Haitian debt, including our new loan. If we succeed—and I'm sure we will succeed—even this loan will turn out to be finally a grant, because all the debt will have been deleted. And that's the very important thing for Haiti now,” the Managing Director added.”

IMF vs The Bank of the South - IMF to Clean Up Its Act?

At the Group of 20 summit in London last month, President Obama pledged to boost IMF funding to "help countries weather the global economic crisis." On Thursday, May 21st, the Senate approved the IMF funding as a part of the $91 billion funding bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This seems appropriate somehow, since international banking institutions like the IMF have laid waste to the economies of poor countries of the global south.
The IMF, World Bank and International Development Bank (IDB) have similar stated missions: "working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world." However, a 2000 internal World Bank report concluded that poor countries are better off without structural adjustment and that some of their policies do not work. Almost a decade later no significant reforms to these antiquated policies have been made, not at the World Bank, not at the IMF nor at the IDB.
Some of the general issues that are of great concern to countries who have been burned by these institutions are outlined below. Additionally, the human rights abuses perpetrated against Haiti by the IDB are also explained. Unfortunately, when these human rights abuses were happening in Haiti, calls for accountability fell on Congress' deaf ears.
Is the global economic crisis enough to spur legislators in Washington to look into past abuses in order to avoid future missteps by these antiquated institutions? Not likely. Washington's modus operandi is to *move on* from crisis to crisis with no accountability for past abuses. When a crisis results from bad policies, the mantra from Washington is predictable; *we must look forward, and not backward*.
While it's clear that international banking institutions, sorely need to have "pre-conditions" for any new funding, what is not clear is whether the Congress has the will to impose or enforce any existing or new standards. Particularly, if it would require reform of the existing policies of these institutions.
The world banking system has virtually collapsed from greed and corruption, yet aside from show hearings, no real reform or accountability for Wall Street and banks has taken place in Congress. Also, to date the particularly predatory, criminal practices of the IMF, World Bank and IDB have not come under any substantive scrutiny from the mainstream media.
For instance, the IDB is accused of human rights violations in Haiti. An expose in 2008 by the RFK Center's Human Rights Director Monika Kalra Varma and the Director of Zamni Lasante, Loune Viaud sites internal emails at the IDB:

"In 2001, US officials threatened to use their influence to stop previously-approved IDB funding unless Haiti's majority political party submitted to political demands to accept a particular apportionment of seats in a Haitian electoral oversight body. Soon after, at the behest of the US, instead of disbursing the loans as planned, the IDB and its members took the unprecedented step of implicitly adding conditions to require political action by Haiti before the funds would be released. These actions violated the IDB's own charter, which strictly prohibits the bank and its members from interfering in the internal political affairs of member states."
... The results have been devastating. The town of Port-de-Paix, selected 10 years ago by the IDB as the first project site due to its particularly deplorable water situation, has yet to see the implementation of any water projects. A study conducted by Zanmi Lasante, Partners In Health, the Robert F Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, and New York University's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice found no functioning public water sources in the city.
Researchers found three-quarters of water sources in the city contained high levels of coliform bacteria, a key indicator of contamination with faecal matter. A frightening 15% of households reported symptoms likely related to typhoid.

If the US and other member states join the IDB and take on the responsibility to improve conditions in the Americas, they cannot then use their membership to undermine the basic rights of the people they claim to serve simply to advance their own political agenda.
The IDB and the US government must take responsibility for their actions and implement the necessary transparency mechanisms to ensure that such abuses do not recur. Congressional inquiries and annual reviews of the Treasury by the Government Accountability Office could provide the oversight necessary to prevent future political misuse of the IDB and its funds. The people of Haiti, as well as US taxpayers, deserve a system that makes public the status of IDB loans and projects in Haiti in order to ensure that the US and IDB member states uphold their commitments to development and human rights."

The IMF is often criticized for undermining the basic rights of the people they claim to serve.The onerous pre-conditions they impose on poor countries for *development* loans, more often than not perpetuate poverty, underdevelopment and exploitation.

"Some IMF conditions that countries have been forced to comply with can only be described as harsh and undemocratic. Often the devaluation of a nation’s currency has been a precondition for IMF assistance. In order to qualify for IMF loans, some nations have also been forced to lower tariffs, restrict governmental subsidies and spending, balance budgets, as well as sell-off state institutions to foreign interests. In some cases, the IMF has even prohibited wage increases as some countries have tried to do so, in order to compensate for a sharp rise in food prices and other commodities. Environmental and labor rights have also taken a hit as a result of IMF policies. Under the guise of helping economic distraught countries, the IMF is really bailing out foreign investors and multinational corporations. They have further fueled chaos and instability in some of the poorest regions in the world."

-- The IMF: Raping The World, One Poor Nation at a Time

Admittedly, these international banking institutions will most likely never be held accountable for their greed and inhumanity. We have only to look at the bailout of the Wall Street speculators for confirmation of this fact.
A most significant and positive development on the global stage has been the founding of The Bank of the South by Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and his allies in May 2007. The bank is intended as an alternative to the IMF and The World Bank and intends to remedy what some perceive as "a double standard which allows richer countries to use fiscal expansion in the face of recession while poorer nations are forced into stricter economic restraints."
In fact, there has been a significant decrease in "Latin America's dependence on the IMF between 2005 and 2008, with outstanding loans falling from 80% of the IMF's $81bn loan portfolio, to 1% of the IMF's $17bn of outstanding loans.

"In April [2007], Venezuela announced that it was paying off all its outstanding debt with the World Bank—totaling $3.3 billion and dating from before President Hugo Chavez took office in (1999)—five years ahead of schedule. Venezuelan Minister of Finance Rodrigo Cabezas said that because of this, “Venezuela is free ... and thank God, neither today’s Venezuelans nor children yet to be born will owe one single cent to those organizations.” Later that month, in the wake of the Wolfowitz scandal, President Chavez declared that Venezuela was withdrawing its membership in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. "

The Bank of the South has been heralded as a step in the formation of a unified Latin America. As Nadia Martinez of TomPaine.com puts it: Adios, World Bank! Also, the formation of this alternative bank could be effective in pushing the IMF to reform its ways. Free market competition for development funding from The Bank of The South, is more likely than any proposed Congressional oversight to motivate reform at the IMF, World Bank and IDB. Hopefully, this will mean that poor and developing countries can say, adios/goodbye to the antiquated politicies of the World Bank, IMF and IDB.
Interestingly, an article on the IMF website from February 2009 claims that it is focused on "...Bank Clean Up." Of course, they mean the clean up of banks "damaged" by the global economic crisis, but they should examine the IMF banking system itself for reform and "clean up."

Why Haiti Is So Poor: Racism.

"The people of Haiti are as poor as human beings can be," John Maxwell begins, in his article "Haiti: Racism and poverty." Mr. Maxwell then outlines the immense wealth of Robert Zoellick, a former partner at Goldman Sachs, a man who's "entertainment allowance could probably feed the entire population for a day or two." So, Mr. Maxwell concludes, "It is not hard to understand that Mr Zoellick cannot understand why Haiti needs debt relief."

Haiti is now forced by the World Bank and the IMF, to pay more than $1 million a week for debts incurred by the US supported dictatorships of Papa and Baby Doc Duvalier, the succeeding military government (1991-1994) of coup plotters sponsored by the US and the US installed puppet government of Gerard Latortue—that was brought about by the US coup-knapping of President Aristide in 2004.

In order to qualify for further financial assistance or really more debt burden, Haiti must prove itself "credit worthy" by paying this onerous and unjust debt.

Bush announces Robert Zoellick as his choice to head the World Bank 06.30.07. Zoellick is described as one of Bush’s best friends and closest allies and an ultra-globalist PNAC war hawk. Pic: R.L. Wollenberg A joint press release by Center for Economic and Policy Research, Haiti Advocacy Platform Ireland-UK, Haiti Support Group, Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti, Jubilee Debt Campaign UK, Jubilee USA Network, Partners in Health is posted at Indybay.com takes Mr. Zoellick to task for having "misled" storm-struck Haitians over debt cancellation promises made during his recent visit to Haiti. The following is an excerpt of the press release: Call for World Bank chief to explain claim that $500m Haitian debt already cancelled – weeks after relief delayed by six months Haitian and international civil society groups have today written to World Bank President Robert Zoellick asking him to clarify ‘misleading’ remarks about debt cancellation made on a visit to storm-ravaged Haiti last week. [1] Zoellick is reported to have told journalists in Port-au-Prince that Haiti’s $1.7 billion debt was “half-forgiven” and promised “the rest of the debt” could soon be cancelled. [2] He was also reported to have stated that $500 million of Haitian debt had already been cancelled. [3] In fact, none of Haiti’s debt stock has yet been cancelled by the World Bank, and in recent weeks the World Bank has delayed debt cancellation for Haiti by six months. This comes as the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes described the four hurricanes that have struck the country as the “worst disaster in the last 100 years” to strike Haiti. [4] Mr. Maxwell continues to outline Haiti's past and recent history in his indictment of the racist, corporatist, imperialistic and White supremist system that keeps Haiti underdeveloped and desperately poor: The reason Haiti is in its present state is pretty simple: Canada, the United States and France, all of whom consider themselves civilized nations, colluded in the overthrow of the democratic government of Haiti four years ago. They did this for several excellent reasons: Haiti 200 years ago defeated the world’s then major powers, France (twice), Britain and Spain, to establish its independence and to abolish plantation slavery. This was unforgivable. Despite being bombed, strafed and occupied by the United States early in the past century, and despite the American endowment of a tyrannical and brutal Haitian army designed to keep the natives in their place, the Haitians insisted on re-establishing their independence. Having overthrown the Duvaliers and their successors, the Haitians proceeded to elect as president a little Black parish priest who had become their hero by defying the forces of evil and tyranny. The new president of Haiti, Jean Bertrand Aristide, refused to sell out (privatize) the few assets owned by the government (the public utilities mainly). Aristide also insisted that France owed Haiti more than $25 billion in repayment of blood money extorted from Haiti in the 19th century as alleged compensation for France’s loss of its richest colony and to allow Haiti to gain admission to world trade. Aristide threatened the hegemony of a largely expatriate ruling class of so-called “elites” whose American connections allowed them to continue the parasitic exploitation and economic strip mining of Haiti following the American occupation. Haiti, like Cuba, is believed to have in its exclusive economic zone huge submarine oil reserves, greater than the present reserves of the United States. Haiti would make a superb base from which to attack Cuba. The American attitude to Haiti was historically based on American disapproval of a free Black state just off the coast of their slave-based plantation economy. This attitude was pithily expressed in Thomas Jefferson’s idea that a Black man was equivalent to three fifths of a white man. It was further apotheosized by Woodrow Wilson’s Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan, who expostulated to Wilson: “Imagine! Niggers speaking French!” The Haitians clearly did not know their place. In February 2004, Mr. John McCain’s International Republican Institute, assisted by Secretary of State Colin Powell, USAID and the CIA , kidnapped Aristide and his wife and transported them to the Central African Republic as “cargo” in a plane normally used to “render” terrorists for torture outsourced by the U.S. to Egypt, Morocco and Uzbekistan. Before Mr. Zoellick went to Haiti last week, the World Bank announced that Mr. Zoellick’s visit would “emphasize the Bank’s strong support for the country.” Mr. Zoellick added: “Haiti must be given a chance. The international community needs to step up to the challenge and support the efforts of the Haitian government and its people.” “If Robert Zoellick wants to give Haiti a chance, he should start by unconditionally cancelling Haiti’s debt,” says Brian Concannon of the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti. “Instead the World Bank - which was established to fight poverty - continues to insist on debt payments when Haitians are starving to death and literally mired in mud.” “After four hurricanes in a month and an escalating food crisis, it is outrageous that Haiti is being told it must wait six more months for debt relief,” said Jubilee USA Network National Coordinator Neil Watkins. “Haiti’s debt is both onerous and odious,” added Dr. Paul Farmer of Partners In Health. “The payments are literally killing people, as every dollar sent to Washington is a dollar Haiti could spend on healthcare, nutrition and feeding programs, desperately needed infrastructure and clean water. Half of the loans were given to the Duvaliers and other dictatorships and spent on presidential luxuries, not development programs for the poor. Mr. Zoellick should step up and support the Haitian government by canceling the debt now.” “Unconditional debt cancellation is the first step in addressing the humanitarian crisis in Haiti,” according to TransAfrica Forum Executive Director Nicole Lee. “There is also an urgent need for U.S. policy towards Haiti to shift from entrenching the country in future debt to supporting sustainable, domestic solutions for development.” The above quotations are taken from an appeal by the organizations represented above. Further comment is superfluous.

Further Reading:
HAITI: Activists Urge World Bank to Erase Crippling Debt
By Nergui Manalsuren
Inter Press Service (IPS)