“We believe that our policies are going to work. We don’t expect the military regime (in Haiti) to be there six months from now.”
Six months? William Gray, President Clinton’s special adviser on Haiti, can’t have been serious when he made that statement Wednesday following another shift in Clinton’s ham-handed handling of the confrontation with Haiti’s illegitimate government.
Six months hence, the generals could be the only people left in Haiti, so rapidly is it emptying out.
A month, six weeks, two months at the most-the U.S. and its allies in the United Nations ought not wait longer than that to rid Haiti of its ruling thugs.
As soon as planning is complete for a UN peacekeeping and Haiti-rebuilding force, Washington should give the top three Haitian strongmen a deadline for departing the scene and then remove them by force if they fail to meet the deadline.
Whatever Gray and President Clinton may assert about U.S. policies, the fact is that the junta remains defiant in the face of pressure aimed at reviving the fledgling democracy left for dead when President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was ousted in 1991.
The longer Washington postpones decisive action to reverse the results of that coup, the root cause of Haiti’s present crisis, the longer it will be forced to wrestle with its many symptoms, including the king-sized refugee exodus.
Sadly, the U.S. has compiled a shameful record in coping with this humanitarian challenge. Under Presidents Bush and Clinton, it has been cruel, unfair and racist toward Haitians. They have been denied access to refuge in America to a degree that would be unthinkable were they Europeans or Cubans.
President Clinton finally bowed to criticism this spring and stopped sending intercepted boat people directly back to Haiti. But a flood of refugees now has swamped the system for hearing asylum claims.
On Tuesday Clinton said Haitians picked up at sea would be sheltered outside Haiti but would no longer have a chance at resettlement in the U.S.
Boat people whose politics put them in jeopardy are to be sent to camps in Panama and on Antigua and Dominica. Those who fled for economic reasons are to be repatriated-never mind, apparently, that sanctions-induced poverty is a political problem.
The U.S. should offer all Haitian boat people a temporary haven while it acts quickly to improve conditions in Haiti. That means seeing to the military regime’s exit by fall, not by New Year’s Day.
