Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007
INTELLIGENCE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2007 -- (House of Representatives - April 26, 2006)
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Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chairman, I rise to support the Lee amendment, which would require the President to submit to Congress a report describing any authorization in the past 10 years to engage in intelligence activities related to the overthrow of a democratically-elected government.
In February of 2004, our government was a party to a coup d'etat that overthrew President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the democratically-elected President of Haiti. Former soldiers and other heavily-armed thugs took over several Haitian cities and then marched into Haiti's capital, while opposition groups representing Haiti's wealthy elites staged confrontational demonstrations throughout the country. Early in the morning on February 29, U.S. Marines and Embassy officials entered President Aristide's home and told him to leave immediately or he and thousands of other Haitians would be killed. President Aristide was flown aboard a U.S. plane to the Central African Republic and left there.
The Bush administration had been working with the wealthy Haitian elites who hated President Aristide to force him to step down. The International Republican Institute, which is affiliated with the Republican Party, funneled U.S. taxpayer dollars to the Aristide-haters; and Roger Noriega, President Bush's former Assistant Secretary of State for Western
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Hemisphere Affairs, conspired with sweatshop-owner Andre Apaid to organize, train and finance the opposition.
Congress has a right to know why the Bush administration allowed a small minority of wealthy elites and a group of heavily armed thugs to overthrow a democratically-elected government. More importantly, Congress has a right to know whether U.S. intelligence agencies and operatives were directly involved in this coup d'etat.
I urge my colleagues to support the Lee amendment and demand that Congress uncover the truth about the coup d'etat in Haiti.
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