The National Coalition for Haitian Rights (NCHR) alleges in a report released on Aug. 19 that there is a corps of armed civilian auxiliaries, known in Haiti as attachés, operating out of several police stations around Haiti as part of a “government strategy.”

Published in French, the report singles out police stations in towns around the country such as Pétion-Ville, Gonaïves, Cap-Haïtien, Trou-du-Nord and Hinche as well as in Port-au-Prince neighborhoods like Delmas 33, Carrefour, and Cité Soleil, as places out of which the alleged attachés operate, carrying out “torture” and “beatings.” The NCHR even refers to certain zones around the capital as “slaughterhouses,” so numerous are the attachés’ supposed victims.

The report says that the attachés’ “favorite targets are rich merchants, businessmen, owners of brand-new vehicles, former soldiers, opposition political militants, and Haitians who have just returned from abroad.”

These armed auxiliaries are grouped in “a special unit called the Special Brigade (BS) and wear black T-shirts with a yellow BS on the back,” the NCHR charges. This “phenomenon of attachés,” evident during three decades of Duvalierist and military dictatorships, has returned since the “launching on June 28, 2001 of the zero tolerance operation.”

That operation, announced by President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, called for rigor from policemen and judges in bringing to justice zenglendos – as violent criminals are called – who have wrought havoc in Haiti for years.

Haitian government spokesman Mario Dupuy denied that there were attachés in the Haitian National Police (PNH) and counter-charged that the NCHR was “attempting to destabilize the government by undermining the morale of the police.” The NCHR, a darling of Washington’s liberal establishment, has revealed itself over the years to be politically hostile to the Aristide’s government.

The NCHR report was issued shortly after a policeman, Jean Panel Charles, deserted his post at the Delmas 33 station, supposedly because he was unwilling to sanction the wrongdoings of the supposed attachés there. One wonders if the timing was coincidental.

The NCHR goes to great lengths to equate the alleged attachés with the FRAPH, a death-squad which served the generals who carried out the 1991-94 coup d’état, as well as the Duvalier dictatorship’s infamous Volunteers for National Security (VSN), informally known as the Tonton Macoutes.

“After the fall of the Duvalier dynasty in February 1986, the corps of the Volunteers for National Security was officially dissolved,” the report says. “Nobody thought that anybody would revive, in whatever form, this form of state organization, this way of governing with the support of armed bands.” The NCHR charges that the Haitian government has “intentionally maintained” the very lawlessness and anarchy, called in Haiti “insecurity,” which has destabilized it.

In an effort to lend weight to its accusations, the NCHR published a copy of an identity card supposedly issued by Delmas police chief, Emmanuel Mompremier, to a supposed attaché named Fabe Fénol.

However, the title given to Fénol on the back of the card is “Police Informant.” Nothing on the card “proves” that he is an attaché. Police forces around the world use informants. In the U.S., for example, the FBI regularly infiltrates the criminal gangs of the Mafia. Why shouldn’t the PNH use the same methods to combat the rampant banditry which plagues Haiti and which is used as a tool of destabilization?

The NCHR published the names and photos of over a dozen of the “cruelest” supposed attachés, without any proof of their heinous acts other than asserting that they were “the most known.”

The report also published the pictures of a half dozen other civilians without establishing any link to this supposed attaché force. The NCHR charges that these armed civilians (of which there are thousands of all political persuasions in Haiti) accompanied René Civil, the leader of the pro-Lavalas Popular Power Youth (JPP), to Jacmel for the baptism of his nephew in January 2002.

Civil reacted quickly to the report, saying he had absolutely no idea who were the individuals shown in the photos. Curiously, these individuals all seem to be posing with the same beat-up old Uzi, which makes the “photo exposé” appear rather contrived.

But let’s suppose for a moment that the photos were the fruit of infiltration of PNH operations by the NCHR. Is it so unlikely that a “fifth column” policeman who is ready to feed information to a pro-Washington anti-government group like the NCHR might not also be dealing with, say, the CIA? Shouldn’t the Police Inspector General look into this matter?

The NCHR also presents Mme. Judie C. Roy, imprisoned last month in the Pétionville police station, as a “leader of an opposition political party” and a victim of supposed attaché “torture.” The NCHR makes not a peep about the heavy arms and shirts inscribed with the official name of an active anti-government guerilla group – “Citizens’ Protection Force” – found at her home. In fact, apart from recent equivocal statements after the murder and burning of four Interior Ministry employees, the NCHR never denounces the numerous violent acts of anti-government guerillas on the Central Plateau and in other regions. This “human rights” organization generally turns a blind eye to the subversive actions of the “armed wing” of the Haitian opposition.

On Aug. 18, the NCHR also castigated the Haitian government’s recent moves to hold parliamentary elections in November and December, invoking Organization of American States Resolution 822, a position completely in tune with the U.S. Embassy in Haiti. The NCHR’s press release says that “while acknowledging the parliamentary void that will ensue in January should elections not be held this year, NCHR notes that such void is the result, for the most part, of the GOH’s many missed opportunities to address the issues surrounding elections and its failure to respect its commitments,” a position which completely obfuscates the Washington-supported Haitian opposition’s obstructionist role.

It is worthwhile to recall a little of NCHR’s background. Formed in 1982 by U.S. lawyer Michael Hooper and another U.S. citizen of Haitian origin, Jocelyn McCalla, as the National Coalition for Haitians Refugees, the group focused primarily on refugee affairs.

In 1995, it changed “Refugees” to “Rights” in its name.

The NCHR is a close cousin of and has shared office space with the liberal establishment’s Human Rights Watch (HRW), which, like the NCHR, scandalized Haitian activists by heaping blame on Aristide for supposed human rights violations immediately after the Sep. 30, 1991 coup, perfectly assisting Washington’s campaign of vilifying the victim. The HRW board is filled with former U.S. government officials and even a general.

The NCHR is also financed by the powerful capitalist financier Georges Soros, known for his maverick defense of globalization and the new world order. The Hungarian-born Soros has accumulated more than $7 billion in ruthless currency speculating and has financed anti-communist foundations throughout Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to promote privatization and neoliberal policies. He also was central in the U.S. led campaign to dismantle Yugoslavia.

For years, Haitian progressives have viewed NCHR as far from impartial in its role in Haiti. Under the guise of “human rights,” it provides the “moral” veil for Washington’s merciless campaign of undermining the Haitian people’s struggle for democracy and sovereignty.

All of these considerations should not in any way whitewash the Haitian police. Of course, there are policemen who overstep their authority and commit reprehensible acts against the people. Haïti Progrès has always denounced the conduct of bad elements in the police and called for their removal and judgement. However, the NCHR’s suspicious report tries to stigmatize the entire police force and seems aimed at assisting U.S. imperialism’s efforts to demonize the government and destabilize the country. In this sense, police authorities should clean up their institution and explain clearly to the people what is going on inside it.