CIA linked to FRAPH, coup

PORT-AU-PRINCE -- The link between the US government and the founding and running of the Haitian army's death squad and front group, FRAPH (Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien), was finally exposed in the October 24 issue of the US Nation magazine.

As long suspected, the Central Intelligence Agency created and has advised FRAPH. The link is Emmanuel Constant, a paid CIA employee and informant. Also, at least some FRAPH “members” were paid by the US-government-funded Centres pour le Developpement et la Sante (CDS), run by Dr Reginald Boulos and linked to FRAPH and to anti-democratic activities in the past.

As a result of the information -- which has been at the top of news programs and on the front page here as well as in the US -- the CIA and other government agencies have gone into “damage control” mode, saying Constant worked for them only until “spring” of 1993 (FRAPH was formed in August) and that the CIA was never “connected” to FRAPH. One of Constant's “handlers”, US Colonel Patrick Collins, a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) attache in Haiti from 1989-1992 and who recently returned for the occupation, has reportedly been recalled to Washington for questioning.

In his article in the Nation, Allan Nairn detailed how Constant worked for both the CIA and the brutal intelligence service it created and ran, the Service d'Intelligence National (SIN), which spied on, brutalised and murdered up to 5000 members of the democratic movement between 1986 and 1991.

Constant was a spy and also taught courses, like one on the ti legliz [“little church”, a popular church movement], which he called “the extreme left” and which he said taught people to kill soldiers and rich people. In the article, Constant also revealed that CIA and DIA people, including Collins, were at Haitian army headquarters on the night of the coup d'etat three years ago, and implied he still works with the CIA and embassy.

Those implications were borne out when the US organised a press conference for Constant on October 5. Surrounded by dozens of heavily armed US soldiers and speaking at a US government-supplied podium, Constant told reporters that FRAPH would be laying down its weapons, welcomed the president's return and would work for “reconciliation”.

When asked how he could call FRAPH “terrorist” and “anti-democratic” one day and then organise a conference for it the next, embassy spokesman Stanley Schrager said, “Life is bizarre, isn't it? Things change all the time ...”
[Reprinted from Haiti Info.]

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