Canadian NGO joint statement supports Canadian foreign policy against Haiti
Image taken from the Coopération Canada website.
Written by: Travis Ross
On May 10, 2024, three associations of non-governmental organizations (NGO) based in Canada published a joint statement directed at top Canadian cabinet ministers, feigning concern for Haitian sovereignty, while actually supporting Canada’s foreign policy against Haiti.
The joint statement makes three recommendations to the government: Support the recently sworn-in Transitional Presidential Council (TPC), advocate with the United-States government to stop arms trafficking to Haiti, and develop a more inclusive humanitarian aid policy for Haiti.
The three associations behind the joint statement are: the Association québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale (AQOCI), Coopération Canada, and Concertation pour Haïti (CPH). The members of these associations overlap considerably and include NGOs, Quebec union federations, faith-based organizations, and some solidarity groups. Prime-Minister Justin Trudeau, Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly and Minister of International Development Ahmed Hussen were the MPs whom the message was directed towards.
Thirty-one of the member-organizations are signatories to the joint statement. The majority of whom have no current projects in Haiti. Of the seven NGOs who do have ongoing projects in Haiti, all receive funding from the Canadian government. The joint statement is supported by another nine organizations based in Haiti: They are a mix of NGOs, as well as a faith-based organization and a University. A majority of these organizations receive funding from Canadian or French governments.
Canadian funding for Haitian NGOs and the 2004 coup
On the surface, the joint statement’s recommendations seem reasonable. Untangling the consequences of these policy recommendations reveals a fundamental support for Canada’s ongoing policy of armed intervention in Haiti.
First, consider the role of these associations of NGOs, as well as some of their members, in aiding in the spread of disinformation about the Aristide government before the 2004 coup d'etat that forced Haiti’s democratically elected leader from power.
Then-Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide had won the 2000 election with almost 92 per cent of the popular vote. The election was a resounding victory for Aristide and Fanmi Lavalas (FL), which won local elections across Haiti and 16 out of 17 senate seats.
On Feb. 29, 2004, a coup d’état backed by the U.S., Canadian, and French governments forced Aristide from office, with Canada having played a key role
The first meeting, referred to as the “Ottawa Initiative on Haiti,” was held at the federal government’s conference center on Meech Lake near Canada’s capital, on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1, 2003. This secretive meeting laid the groundwork for a military intervention that would occur a year later by U.S. and Canadian forces against Aristide.
Canada provided 50 soldiers to secure Haiti’s Toussaint Louverture International Airport. Aristide was abducted by a U.S. SEAL team and flown out of this “secured” airport to be left in the Central African Republic.
The coup had a devastating effect on Haitian society.
A 2006 Lancet study revealed that “during the 22-month period of the U.S.-backed Interim Government, 8,000 people were murdered in the greater Port-au Prince area alone. 35,000 women and girls were raped or sexually assaulted, more than half of the victims were children.”
Mario Joseph, director of the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI) argues that “if the Lancet cited 8,000 murders in Port-au-Prince between 2004 and 2006, we have to double this number to reflect what happened throughout the country.”
The Canadian government also helped to fund various NGOs in Haiti who played various roles collaborating with the coup government to suppress dissent and disseminate disinformation about the Aristide government. Central to these efforts were Pierre Espérance, director of NCHR-Haiti (later renamed the RNDDH) and Danièle Magloire, who worked in several so-called human rights groups.
Backed by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the CIA-front National Endowment for Democracy (NED), NCHR-Haiti, led by Pierre Espérance, engaged in a “close working partnership with Latortue’s dictatorship.” According to Richard Sanders, NCHR-Haiti “became, in effect, an arm of the illegal ‘interim’ government” of Haiti (IGH).
Brian Concannon, the director of the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH), described NCHR-Haiti as a “ferocious critic” of Aristide’s government and an “ally” of the illegal regime.
According to Concannon, the Latortue regime “had an agreement with NCHR-Haiti to prosecute anyone the organization denounced.”
“People perceived to support Haiti’s constitutional government or Fanmi Lavalas, the political party of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, [were] systematically persecuted from late February through the present. In many cases, the de facto government of Prime Minister Gérard Latortue is directly responsible for the persecution,” Concannon explained. NCHR-Haiti “became increasingly politicized and, in the wake of the 2004 coup d’état, it cooperated with the IGH in persecuting Lavalas activists. The persecution became so flagrant that NCHR-Haiti’s former parent organization, New York-based NCHR, publicly repudiated the Haitian group and asked it to change its name” to the Réseau National de Défense de Droits Humains (RNDDH).
The fraudulent reports produced by the RNDDH were then used as a justification by Canadian NGOs to condemn the Aristide government and the Lavalas movement.
A recent investigation published by The Canada Files revealed that the Canadian government returned to funding RNDDH through a Canadian NGO named Avocats sans Frontières.
Canadian NGOs provide support for 2004 coup
The book “Canada in Haiti: Waging war on the poor majority”, by Anthony Fenton and Yves Engler, details how the disinformation produced by Canadian government funded NGOs inside Haiti was repeated by NGOs inside Canada, supporting Canada’s policy of “regime change” against Aristide’s popular government.
They explain that “Canadian-based NGOs helped the federal government use ‘development assistance’ as a tool for political influence.” Fenton and Engler show through documents obtained from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) that “organizations ideologically opposed to Lavalas were the sole recipients of Canadian government funding.”
These documents also revealed that Quebec unions “received hundreds of thousands of dollars in CIDA money for work in Haiti through” the Centre international de solidarité ouvrière (Center for International Worker Solidarity - CISO). These funds were then used to denounce the Fanmi Lavalas government on multiple occasions. The NGOs based their conclusions on disinformation drawn from NCHR - Haiti (now RNDDH) reports and other Canadian-funded organizations.
CISO, along with its members the FTQ, the CSN, and FIQ, are all signatories to the recently released joint statement on Haiti. CISO is also a member organization of AQOCI and Concertation pour Haiti (CPH).
Fenton and Engler also reveal that AQOCI “urged the Liberal government to withdraw support for the ‘Lavalas party regime’”, relying on discredited reports by NCHR - Haiti. Meaning, an association of Canadian NGOs condemned a foreign government based on allegations made by an organization in Haiti receiving funds from CIDA and the NED. Furthering Ottawa and Washington’s goal to spread disinformation framing Aristide and the Fanmi Lavalas party as tyrannical.
In addition, CPH “branded Aristide a ‘tyrant’” and “called for Aristide’s removal.” Showing yet another association of Canadian NGOs who were easily misled by NED and CIDA-funded propaganda. CPH’s misguided trust in the RNDDH led them to invite Marie-Yolène Gilles - the RNDDH’s program director - to Canada, to speak about Aristide’s alleged corruption.
Later, Gilles was accused by several witnesses of participating in interrogations of political prisoners with the Haitian National Police. Witnesses accused Gilles of blackmailing them to make false confessions accusing Lavalas leaders of ordering massacres and other crimes. This further shows the RNDDH to have worked closely with the coup regime to persecute Fanmi Lavalas leaders.
The recent joint statement does not acknowledge the profound errors in judgment on the part of CISO, Quebec Unions, AQOCI, Concertation Pour Haiti, and many of its members in supporting the coup against Haiti’s democratically elected President.
It did, however, provide two tortured sentences recognizing the Canadian government’s “past mistakes”, explaining that “to enable Haitians to take their destiny back into their own hands, Canada should help recall the place and role of the diplomatic corps in Haiti, whose sometimes excessive interference in national affairs offends national dignity.” Therefore, “Canada should take note of past mistakes and exercise increased vigilance to restore integrity and honesty in governance while preventing the violation of human rights in Haiti.”
What does the NGO joint statement recommend?
Unsurprisingly, the policy recommendations of a joint statement from these NGOs ultimately supports current Canadian foreign policy in Haiti, which in turn, shares the same goals as American foreign policy.
The joint statement recommends that the Canadian government support “security forces (police and army) with logistical and financial support”.
This policy recommendation is already Canadian foreign policy in Haiti. Canada has consistently provided funding for the Haitian National Police (PNH) over many years. In fact, Canada is the second largest donor to Haiti behind the United States.
In a May 2023 interview, one year before the joint statement was released, Minister of Foreign Affairs Mélanie Joly said “Canada is always a leader on the issue of Haiti,” having “helped train police officers for years.” Joly left out that this police training includes the RCMP being brought to Haiti to train PNH officers immediately after the 2004 coup.
An investigation by authors Nik Barry-Shaw and Dru Oja Jay shows that RCMP-trained PNH officers were “frequently accompanied by U.S and Canadian soldiers and later United Nations forces” as they “embarked on a series of forays into the poorest neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince.” The PNH officers “killed innocent civilians, imprisoned political dissidents without charge, and drove key Aristide supporters into hiding or exile.”
Following a February 22, 2024, announcement by Joly that Canada would provide 80.5M CAD in funding for the MSS, Global Affairs Canada also announced $42.5 million in previously announced funding would be allocated to various UN initiatives.
Global Affairs also provided details about a previous funding pledge. This included $27.1 million to buy personal protective equipment, vehicles, and logistical and communications equipment for the PNH, while $5.9 million would go toward addressing gang-related sexual and gender-based violence.
Reiterating Canada's policies for Haiti, Joly issued a joint statement on May 30, 2024, two weeks after the Canadian NGO joint statement was published on Cooperation Canada’s website, stating that “Canada will remain a committed partner in providing security, development, and humanitarian assistance to the Haitian people.”
Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy is also used as a vector for funding the PNH. In September of 2020, the Trudeau government tendered a $12.5 million contract in operational support to the Haitian police under this policy.
The joint statement's second recommendation focuses on arms trafficking, stating that “Canada should engage in courageous and uncompromising advocacy with the United States to stop arms trafficking to Haiti.”
Indeed, a report delivered to the UN Security Council on January 25, 2024, confirmed that “most of the firearms and ammunition trafficked to Haiti – whether directly or via another country – come from the United States.” Furthermore, a United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime report states that from 2020 to 2022, over 80 per cent of the weapons seized in Haiti and submitted to US authorities for tracing were manufactured in or imported from the United States.
One might presume the Canadian government hasn’t addressed this matter, but Canada’s ambassador to the UN, Bob Rae, has raised the matter on several occasions. On March 27, 2024, Rae told Global News that ‘We need greater effort from the Americans on the export of arms’.
Rae reiterated this point in an interview with Pitasanna Shanmugathas. “I can’t give advice to the government of the United States on how to uphold the rule of law”, Rae said. “Their obligations are clear. I think the United States also has a very clear obligation to deal with the export of arms out of Florida, which is a major problem, and I think that is something which clearly lies within the jurisdiction of the United States.”
Some may disagree whether these comments reflect “uncompromising advocacy”. It is clear, however, that the Canadian government has addressed the issue of illicit flows of arms and ammunition of American weapons to Haiti.
It is unclear, however, whether the Canadian government can affect the illicit gun trade in the Caribbean.
Robert Muggah, the author of the UN report and co-founder of the Igarape Institute explained that “a combination of political and economic elite, gangs and private security companies are procuring weapons from a variety of sources and bringing them into the country on clandestine flights, packed into shipping freight, and carried by mules across the land border.”
“The reality is that, so long as there is high supply and demand for firearms and ammunition, they will continue to be trafficked from the US to its neighbors, including in Haiti”, Muggah said. “This is not just because of the tens of thousands of firearms retail outlets in the US, but also the persistent appetite from the hundreds of criminal gangs across the Caribbean”, he added.
The joint statement also recommends that the Canadian government support Haiti’s recently installed Transitional Presidential Council (TPC).
The Canadian government has only ever provided support for the TPC. In fact, Canada’s new ambassador to Haiti André François Giroux attended the TPC’s swearing in ceremony.
In an April 25, 2024, post to X - two weeks before the joint statement was released - Giroux said “Canada welcomes the inauguration of the Presidential Transitional Council. This collegial Council of National Unity is an important step in restoring security and democracy in Haiti.” Giroux also included a selfie with other attendees.
The joint statement’s recommendations simply reiterate policy that has been endorsed by Washington and the CORE group, of which Canada is a member.
The Canadian NGO joint statement does not clarify that support for the TPC is inextricably linked to support for the controversial Washington-led Multinational Security Support Mission in Haiti (MSS).
Haiti’s TPC’s members were compelled to accept an armed intervention
On February 29, 2024, the Viv Ansamn coalition of armed groups led by Jimmy Cherizier successfully shut down the country's main airport. The closure prevented de facto Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who had left on a US-sponsored trip to Kenya to sign an agreement on the deployment of Kenyan police, from returning to Haiti.
Cherizier’s successful ousting of Henry initiated a series of events that led to the formation of Haiti’s TPC. These events are detailed in Dr. Jemima Pierre’s article “Anatomy of an Invasion” in the Black Agenda Report.
Pierre explained that the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) was initially proposed as a platform for negotiations between various sectors of Haiti’s political and Civil Society elite via their negotiators - an eminent persons group. But in July 2024, CARICOM, who had resisted supporting the MSS, caved in to pressure from Washington and its allies and backed the armed intervention force known as the Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS). This about face came one month after Mélanie Joly hosted a meeting on Haiti with Caribbean Countries and various UN agencies, to discuss the security situation in Haiti.
On March 11, 2024, CARICOM leaders met with Haitian leaders to form a TPC. Pierre explains that “the US chose which Haitian leaders to invite to the discussion and the Core Group - US, France, Canada, Brazil and Mexico - first met privately to work out a plan for Haiti, before bringing in chosen Haitian representation.”
Significantly, the Haitians chosen to be part of the negotiations on the TPC had to agree to U.S. terms for a MSS before being allowed to participate in the discussion.
The TPC’s 9-member council of Haitian political, private sector, civil society, and faith-based representatives eventually settled on a rotating council presidency, beginning with Edgard Leblanc Fils as interim President.
The TPC eventually nominated Garry Conille as acting Prime Minister on May 29. Conille had been living in the U.S. for over a decade. He held several positions in various UN organizations and was Bill Clinton’s chief of staff at the U.N. Office of the Special Envoy, effectively running the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission.
Two weeks later, Conille formed a new interim government. Conille also took the position of interior minister, who oversees the Haitian National Police.
The MSS: Another foreign military intervention in Haiti
Kenyan police officers were recently seen guarding the American Embassy in Haiti. The scene caused outrage on social media, seemingly foreshadowing the true purpose of the MSS in Haiti - defending U.S. interests there.
Later, an unnamed source claimed that the Kenyan police officers were simply guarding while a meeting between Kenyan and U.S. officials took place.
Deployed on June 25, 2024, the initial Kenyan battalion’s deployment followed months of delays. Kenyan opposition parties made multiple attempts to block the deployment, citing the deployment's illegality under Kenyan and Haitian law.
A second deployment of 200 Kenyan police officers landed in Haiti on July 16.
Several other countries have also offered police, including Benin, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Guyana, Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, Bangladesh and Chad. Details of their eventual deployment have not been released.
Ruto may also be facing a recruitment problem: Kenyan police officers were initially promised a departure allowance of 100,000 Kenyan Shillings (about 1072 CAD) for taking part in the MSS. Immediately before the initial 200 Kenyan police officers were deployed, they were informed that they would receive only a fifth of that - 20,000 Kenyan shillings (about 215 CAD).
Kenyan police who want to volunteer for the mission must have no more than two convictions in their lifetimes.
And Kenyan police are notorious for brutality, political oppression, and grisly massacres. On July 1, 2024, Kenyan police murdered a 12-year-old boy who was participating in non-violent protests. Three days before, a 19-year-old high school graduate was shot and killed by Kenyan police. These two victims were among 39 Kenyans killed, according to the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights.
These protests followed Kenyan President Willima Ruto’s attempt to force austerity measures that would drive average Kenyans into poverty.
Meanwhile, Kenyan police officers have also been granted immunity from prosecution. According to the recently signed the Status Of Force Agreement (SOFA) agreement between Kenya and Haiti, “All [Multinational Security Force Mission] MMSS personnel, including locally recruited personnel, enjoy immunity from legal process for all acts performed in the exercise of their official functions (including their words and writings). This immunity continues to have effect even when they are no longer members of the personnel or employed by the Mission and after the other provisions of this Agreement have expired.”
A March 30, 2024, report by the The Canadian Press explained that 70 Canadian Forces members were deployed to train soldiers from Jamaica, Belize and the Bahamas for the MSS.
And on June 26, 2024, Mélanie Joly, Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs, announced that Canada will contribute an additional 5.7M CAD to the United Nations Trust Fund for the MSS. This followed a previous announcement in February pledging 80.5M CAD for the MSS.
The MSS is obviously consequential, and yet the authors of the joint statement didn’t address the MSS. Nor did they address the history of the Kenyan police who will, for the time being, make up the majority of the personnel for this mission.
This omission can easily be interpreted as tacit support for Canada’s enthusiastic support of the MSS.
Who are the Canadian signatories to the joint statement?
According to the joint statement, the recommendations are the result of a virtual meeting organized on April 15, 2024 by the AQOCI, CPH and Cooperation Canada. The joint statement explains that this meeting was attended by seventy participants. Twenty of these participants spoke at the meeting directly from Haiti, representing various sectors of Haitian society. It is unclear how many of these speakers were Haitian.
When The Canada Files asked an AQOCI representative how many of the speakers from Haiti were Haitian, and whether they received funding from the Canadian government, no response was provided.
According to the joint statement, three unidentified Canada-based members of the Haitian diaspora also spoke during the meeting.
The joint statement has the support of thirty Canada-based organizations, along with nine organizations based in Haiti.
All the Canadian NGOs who are signatories are members of one of the three associations who penned the joint statement.
This is a short breakdown of the joint statement’s signatories:
Canadian NGOs with no projects in Haiti: Ten
Among these ten NGOs, those who have had projects in Haiti relied on funding from Global Affairs Canada.
Canadian NGOs with projects in Haiti: Eight.
Seven receive funding from Global Affairs Canada.
Union Federations: FIQ, CSN, FTQ, Labour: CISO - Four
Banks: Desjardins - One (Desjardins is partnered with several Canadian NGOs)
University of Sherbrooke: One
Faith-based: Two, with no projects in Haiti
Solidarity Groups: Four.
Two support the agricultural sector, one reforestation, and one women’s rights.
An analysis of these signatory NGOs and other organizations reveals that eighteen - a majority - have no ongoing projects in Haiti. A handful of those have previously worked in Haiti with funding from Global Affairs Canada.
Of the remaining twelve NGOs and organizations who do have ongoing projects in Haiti, a majority depend on funding from Global Affairs Canada.
UPA Développement international, a non-profit organization, has four ongoing projects in Haiti. The organization is networked with several NGOs in Canada and other local organizations in Haiti, ranging from local Solidarity groups to large NGOs who rely on funding from Global Affairs Canada, like SOCODEVI. Each project is funded in whole or in part by Global Affairs Canada. Their Board of Directors and Steering committee do not include any Haitians. UPA also did not respond for comment. It is unclear whether any of their partners in Haiti were consulted before UPA supported the joint statement.
Only four of these signatories can be regarded as Solidarity Groups actively involved in Haiti, defined loosely as grassroots organizations based in Canada who have direct connections to Haitians in Haiti, and don't rely on Canadian or U.S. government funding. These three Solidarity groups are: Action-Haïti, Solidarité-Haïti en Estrie, and Société pour le reboisement d’Haïti (SRH).
A fourth Solidarity group based in Trois-Rivières, Quebec; the Comité de solidarité/Trois-Rivières (CSTR) has no ongoing projects in Haiti, but has a formal association with Kay Fanm, a feminist organization led by Danièle Magloire. Magloire has a longstanding relationship with the Canadian government (more on Danièle Magloire and FOKAL coming in an upcoming article for The Canada Files).
Action-Haïti and Solidarité-Haïti en Estrie have some commonalities: They support Haitians in the agricultural sector outside of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. Action-Haïti and Solidarité-Haïti en Estrie rely on grassroots fundraising efforts to sustain themselves.
Action-Haïti was contacted for comment, but did not respond.
Jean Charron, Project Manager at Solidarité-Haïti en Estrie, did. He explained that Solidarité-Haïti en Estrie was not invited to the virtual meeting. He and his partner in Haiti support the Transitional Presidential Council in Haiti. Charron shared apprehension about the MSS, explaining that Ruto seems to be motivated by “money and prestige”.
Who are the Haitian signatories to the joint statement?
The nine Haitian organizations who are signatories to the joint statement are a mix of feminist, faith-based, and non-profit organizations.
The two faith-based organizations are both related to the Episcopal Church in Haiti: the Commission épiscopale nationale Justice et paix and Université épiscopale d’Haïti.
The Episcopal church in Haiti has been mired in scandals for most of the past decade. Recently, members of the Church leadership were accused of smuggling guns and ammunition for criminal armed groups in Haiti.
The Episcopal church has been without a Bishop - the leader of the institution - for years. Reverend Jean Madoché Vil, standing committee president of the Diocese of Haiti, has functioned as an interim leader. He was implicated in the arms smuggling case. Initially, Vil cooperated with authorities who were investigating the charges, but was later accused of going into hiding for months to avoid arrest warrants. An arrest warrant was also issued for Father Fritz Désiré, Director of Saint-Pierre College.
This leadership crisis and arms smuggling scandal in Haiti’s Episcopal Church had a direct effect on the Université épiscopale d’Haïti, which is directly associated with the Church.
The Episcopal Church in Haiti’s arms smuggling scandal was uncovered in July 2022. The Université épiscopale d’Haïti closed soon after. Nearly a year later, the University’s main campus was still closed. In a report by the Haitian news outlet Le Placentin in September 2023, students complained that the university had abandoned them, blaming the university’s closure directly on the accusations of criminal activity aimed at Church leadership.
Two months after this report, university leadership blamed their low enrollment rate and lack of professors on insecurity. In the same report by Haitian news outlet Le Nationale, a university official who preferred to remain anonymous “confided that activities have been slowing down for some time”, blaming the university’s lack of resources on low enrollment.
Considering the current state of the Université épiscopale d’Haïti and the accusations the interim leadership have faced, it is reasonable to question how representative they are as an institution in Haiti, and, therefore, as a signatory to this joint statement.
In contrast, the Commission épiscopale nationale Justice et paix represents 355 parishes organized into 10 dioceses. The Executive Committee is made up of 20 delegates from the diocese along with the Board of Directors. Their representatives’ signature may represent a significant portion of the Episcopal community in Haiti.
The Institut culturel Karl Lévêque (ICKL) is a small human rights group based in Haiti. It is led by Reverend Gardy Maisonneuve. The institute does not produce reports and its leader’s politics are generally left-of-center. ICKL focuses on producing commentary on current events and opinion pieces on how to support popular movements.
It is unclear where ICKL gets its funding. The comparatively small size of the organization means it has a small footprint on political discourse in Haiti generally.
The remainder of the Haitian NGOs all take funding from foreign governments. Specifically, the Canadian, French, and American governments.
Kay Fanm, Fanm Deside, & Kri Fanm Ayiti (KRIFA) all receive funding from Global Affairs Canada through the Canadian NGO Lawyers Without Borders.
Union pour le développement et le respect des femmes haïtiennes (UDREFH-Centre) and Fanm Deside receive funding from the French government though the French Embassy in Haiti.
The Centre d’animation paysagère et d’action communautaire (CAPAC) and Centre de formation pour l’entraide et le développement communautaire (CFEDEC) receive funding from EQUITAS, who is in turn, funded by the Canadian government and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).
Finally, some of these NGOs receive funding from private foundations. Kay Fanm’s director Danièle Magloire is also the vice-chair of FOKAL, another NGO who receives funding from the Open Society Foundations (OSF). CFEDEC also receives funding from American Jewish Voices for Peace (AJWS).
AJWS’ top funder is Eric Schmidt, an ex-Google CEO who, according to WIRED, is in a ”unique position as a link between the tech industry and the Pentagon'' in his “mission to rewire the US military with cutting-edge artificial intelligence”. While OSF is funded by George Soros.
These foreign funded NGOs: Kay Fanm, Fanm Deside, KRIFA, CFEDEC, and UDREFH, have other features in common beyond their benefactors. Their organizational objectives focus on women’s rights: equity, maternal care, reproductive health, education, human rights, and the inclusion of women in the formal economy. These organizational objectives align with Canada’s “feminist foreign policy”. More fundamentally, these organizations do not challenge the Canadian and US governments' persistent imperialist interventions against Haitian sovereignty and democracy.
The MSS is a precursor to the American Global Fragility Act
This joint statement is history repeating itself. By presenting recommendations that fundamentally reflect Canada’s current foreign policy in Haiti, these Canadian NGOs help manufacture consent for Washington and Ottawa’s imperialist intervention in Haiti.
The Canadian NGO joint statement is an example of this strategy in action. The joint statement is presented as recommendations, but it is, in effect, emulating Canada’s ongoing foreign policy in Haiti under the pretense of challenging it.
Many of these NGOs and associations helped manufacture consent for the 2004 coup d'etats that violated Haiti’s sovereignty and democracy,a crime that returned Haiti to the imperialist stranglehold it had escaped by defeating the American-backed Duvalier dictatorship.
It is no coincidence that the vast majority of the signatories - whether in Canada or Haiti - receive funding from the Canadian government, or in some cases, the French and American governments.
These organizations help to create a veneer of consensus on Canada’s foreign policy.
The federal government does not provide funding, directly or indirectly, to local organizations or those abroad whose policies and views are in conflict with its own.
Support for the MSS is an endorsement of imperialist interventionism and violence. The Canadian government is not interested in renewing Haitian democracy and sovereignty. Its end goal is the continued subordination of Haiti by Washington as a colonial state under the Global Fragility Act (GFA), a law that is supported by the Canadian government.
Haiti is often the laboratory where Washington tests its new imperialist strategies for maintaining hegemony. In this instance, the GFA is the new experiment in imperialist domination of Haiti.
The U.S. and Canadian government’s efforts to organize the MSS is necessary to install a government which will agree to signing the GFA, which will create a bilateral agreement for the deployment of U.S. troops in Haiti.
As U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols explained, Washington has “a long term strategy for Haiti under the Global Fragility Act that has a ten year plan to support Haiti’s increased stability and autonomy.”
The GFA emphasizes building relationships with “local civil society” by “strengthen[ing] the capacity of the United States to be an effective leader of international efforts to prevent extremism and violent conflict.”
This “capacity” includes negotiating 10-year “security assistance” agreements with “partner” nations.
The “autonomy” Nichols hopes to foster is from Russia and China. This adversarial stance on Russia and China results from their rapprochement with “fragile states” which involves geo-strategic concerns, including access to raw materials.
A “partnership” under the GFA between Haiti and Washington would ensure that Haiti remains under U.S. hegemony for decades.
Travis Ross is a teacher based in Montreal, Québec. He is also the co-editor of the Canada-Haiti Information Project at canada-haiti.ca. Travis has written for Haiti Liberté, Black Agenda Report, The Canada Files, TruthOut, and rabble.ca. He can be reached on Twitter.
Editor’s note: The Canada Files is the country's only news outlet focused on Canadian foreign policy. We've provided critical investigations & hard-hitting analysis on Canadian foreign policy since 2019, and need your support.
Please consider setting up a monthly or annual donation through Donorbox.
More Articles
