Barely a whisper in the news at the moment. Let's see if we can't blog it up a little.
President Aristide Says "I was kidnapped"The political blogs are all afire about this. Is Aristide just having "buyer's remorse"? Wasn't he a thug anyway, and why should we care? On the other hand, the U.S. clearly wanted him out, and have done for a long time. And it's not like they haven't arranged coups before. Allende, anyone? (I don't know much about Haiti, or whether Aristide was well liked by his people). But when the man himself calls up and says he was kidnapped...maybe he was kidnapped!
Multiple sources that just spoke with Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide told Democracy Now! that Aristide says he was 'kidnapped' and taken by force to the Central African Republic. Congressmember Maxine Waters said she received a call from Aristide at 9am EST. 'He's surrounded by military. It's like he is in jail, he said. He says he was kidnapped,' said Waters. She said he had been threatened by what he called US diplomats. According to Waters, the diplomats reportedly told the Haitian president that if he did not leave Haiti, paramilitary leader Guy Philippe would storm the palace and Aristide would be killed. According to Waters, Aristide was told by the US that they were withdrawing Aristide's US security.TransAfrica founder and close Aristide family friend Randall Robinson also received a call from the Haitian president early this morning and confirmed Waters account. Robinson said that Aristide 'emphatically' denied that he had resigned. 'He did not resign,' he said. 'He was abducted by the United States in the commission of a coup.' Robinson says he spoke to Aristide on a cell phone that was smuggled to the Haitian president.