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View Full Version : Philly 01-27: Haiti to Honduras: No US Intervention



Communist
24th January 2010, 03:37
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From Haiti to Honduras: No US Intervention!

Join in informational protest from 4:30-6pm on Wednesday, Jan. 27th on the steps of Philadelphia City Hall (http://www.aviewoncities.com/philadelphia/cityhall.htm) at 15th & Market St. to distribute information on developments in Honduras and Haiti.

For more information email phillyiac(AT)peoplesmail.net ([email protected]) or call 215-724-1618.

The United States's goal to control the region for the benefit of its corporations has no boundaries, whether posing as an aiding partner as in Haiti, or through the imposition of an illegitimate government as in Honduras; through 'diplomacy' or through blatant military force.

These countries, two of the poorest in the hemisphere and under different circumstances, have shown the callousness and criminal arrogance of the imperialist north, whose aim in both is the same: to keep them underdeveloped, to steal their resources and labor and to use them as a ghostly example of USA's might against the progressive developments in Latin America and the Caribbean where massive movements of Indigenous, Afro descendants, peasants and workers have led to governments that work on behalf of the people, not for the benefit of USA's transnational corporations.

In Haiti (http://www.workers.org/haiti/), after the terrible earthquake that claimed the lives of more than 100,000 people, left thousands injured and millions homeless, the United States has mounted, not a humanitarian operation, but a massive military one involving 40,000 troops heavily armed, reconnaissance drones, destroyers and the Aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinsonwith Sidewinder missiles and helicopters. It made the government of Haiti sign a "memorandum of understanding" giving the USA total control of who gets in or out of the country.

Since then, U.S. marines control the main airports and have blocked the landing of aid from the Caribbean Community, France, World Food Program and Doctors Without Borders. Unloading military gear and "securing the perimeter" was the Pentagon's priority, not the aiding of Haitians who desperately needed the supplies carried on those planes. Defense Secretary Gates stated that the U.S. "wouldn't send in food and water because, there was no 'structure...to provide security;" this, even though it has been reported at length the restraint and the solidarity among them shown by the desperate Haitian masses.

A large refugee camp at Champs de Mars reported "no relief has arrived; it is all being delivered on other side of town, by the U.S. Embassy." Washington Post reported U.S. rescue operations focused on places frequented by foreigners, such as U.N. headquarters, Montana Hotel and Caribe supermarket.

In contrast, immediately after the quake, Cuba, Venezuela, Iceland and China moved to provide relief right away to the Haitian people without waiting for "security."

In Honduras (http://www.workers.org/honduras/), the U.S. engineered and supported a military coup where Honduran army, trained by the U.S., removed at gunpoint its legitimate President, Manuel Zelaya on June 28, 2009 and installed a criminal government with Roberto Micheletti as the de facto president. The purpose was to prevent the people of Honduras from deciding their own destiny through the convening of a Constitutional Assembly that would put people first instead of the obsolete current Constitution which was drafted in the 80's on behalf of U.S. corporations. At that time Honduras was being used as a U.S. military base against the people of El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua and the constitution was aimed to establish Honduras as a U.S. neocolony where all its the resources would be privatized, transferring in that way the wealth of the country to U.S. hands.

Now the people, impoverished by this U.S. maneuver, want to regain their country and their resources. President Zelaya had paid attention to the masses' demands and had initiated the process to consult the people on this issue. He also developed programs that helped the poorest in the country, established free school lunches and increased the minimum wage by 60%. For this reasons, the wealthy and the businesses in Honduras joined with the U.S. and its hundreds of corporations operating there to get rid of Zelaya and establish a government that would be more responsive to the rich and the corporations both from Honduras and the U.S.

On November 29, with a very low turnout of voters, less than 50%, Porfirio Lobo of the right wing National Party was elected president. The people, who since June 28 have organized themselves under the massive Popular National Front of Resistance to the Coup, do not recognize these elections since they were held under an illegitimate government which has assassinated more than 140 people since the coup, injured, persecuted, harassed, detained and arrested thousands, continue to threaten the leaders of the Resistance, has committed countless human rights violations with the help of the U.S. and paramilitary death squads from Colombia, besides violating the freedom of speech by closing down television and radio stations that reported the truth of the events.

On Wednesday, January 27, Lobo will be inaugurated president of Honduras, but he is not recognized by the majority of the people in Honduras nor most of the international community. Most of the countries around the world had rejected the June coup and had cut all relations with Honduras as long as there was a de facto government product of the coup and President Zelaya was not restituted to office. Except the U.S., who has worked overtime to have his allies accept the de facto government. Now it wants the international community to recognize Lobo and reestablish relations as if nothing has happened.

This is no different from the actions of the U.S. against Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide (http://www.workers.org/2010/world/aristide_0128/) who 6 years ago was overthrown by the USA after it invaded that country, replacing it with a brutal coup regime.

Join in solidarity with millions of people who will be marching in Honduras on January 27 demanding the No Recognition of the new government of Porfirio Lobo, No Amnesty to the Criminal coup plotters and the right of the people to a Constitutional Assembly.



(http://www.iacenter.org/haiti/haiti-iac011510/)
International Action Center (http://www.iacenter.org/haiti/haiti-iac011510/)


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