9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A New Trajectory for Canadian Foreign Policy?, Jun 16 2006
This review is from: Canada in Haiti: Waging War on the Poor Majority (Paperback)
With the release of their short and readable book Canada in Haiti, Yves Engler and Anthony Fenton have offered up a timely and useful critical intervention in an issue that has consistently been either ignored or badly obfuscated by the mainstream Canadian media. The book exposes Canada’s apparent active participation in the destabilization and eventual overthrow of the democratically elected government of Jean Bertrand Aristide in Haiti in early 2004. It also documents how, since that time, Canada has worked through the financial support of NGOs, RCMP training of Haitian police, participation in the UN stabilization force in Haiti, and a host of other diplomatic and monetary overtures – all to prop up the interim Haitian government which presided over police human-rights abuses and protest crack-downs of a ferocity not seen since the brutal Duvalier era.
Haiti’s recent ordeal is by no means unique or new. What is new in this situation, rather, is Canada’s willingness, and apparent enthusiasm, to take on a central role in the planning and execution of such an operation. The book contains well-founded allegations of the use of CIDA funds to help destabilize the Haitian government, followed by the cynical invocation of the “Responsibility to Protect” doctrine, allowing Canada to conveniently swoop in to save the same “failed government” they helped to undermine.
Engler and Fenton have done their homework, unearthing critical documents through the Access to Information Act. The book is somewhat challenging to follow in parts because of the multiple players and their complex relationships to one another. However, this complexity is critical to the case being presented by the authors, and the glossary of acronyms at the beginning of the book comes in useful when your mind gets caught up in the alphabet soup.
People interested or concerned about Canada's role in Afghanistan would benefit greatly from broadening their focus to understand our seemingly new role in the world. This book is a useful tool in that quest for understanding.
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