 Welcome to News Clicks Show, Mapping Fortlines, where we discuss major geopolitical issues from around the world. Today, we're going to be talking about the situation in Haiti, where the defacto President Joanal Moise was assassinated a few days ago, caused a huge wave of shock, especially because Haiti over the past few months and years has been undergoing a lot of a huge crisis. There's been a constitutional crisis in the country over the past few months after Moise's term expired. He was proposing amending the Constitution of 1987 in a manner which many had described as illegal. There was a huge amount of insecurity on the ground in the capital and other cities, armed gangs, violent gangs. Meanwhile, there's also been waves and waves of protest against Moise continuing in power, the kind of reforms and changes he sought to bring. So Haiti has been going through a very difficult situation right now and this assassination is definitely likely to further things, further the crisis. We have with us Prabir Pulkai sir to talk not only about the current situation but also the historical context of Haiti. The way in which things have developed over the past few decades, in fact even over the past few centuries. Prabir, thank you so much for joining us. So quick question on the current situation right now. How do you see the build up right now, especially after the assassination and also the crisis over the past few years? Well, you talked about the crisis of legitimacy of the current government including the assassinated President Moise. But also, who is the Prime Minister currently? The multiple claimants to the position of the Prime Minister. So we don't know who's going to be in charge of the country. You're right that Haiti has been passing through very difficult times. This assassination is also extremely strange because we don't know what the political or other forces behind the assassination that's not clear. It's clear that ex-Columbian servicemen were involved in the hit. It seems they have come from Colombia and there are also two Haitian Americans who were also involved in the hit who claim they had been hired as translators and their task of this group was to quote unquote seize the President but not kill him. So we are completely unclear at the moment what are the forces which have led to the assassination. It doesn't appear to be an American backed assassination because Moise was quite close to the Americans. So in that sense, I do not think it's a coup at the moment at least. I don't think it's a coup. So why Colombian ex-servicemen would be involved in the assassination is still a mystery. It could possibly be a revenge for some drug action that the President might have taken against some of the drug lords in Haiti. So that's something that we don't know. What we do know and I think that's the important part, the fact that Haiti is represented to the world as a failed nation and this has been going on for last 20 years that we can remember and that this hides the fact that it's a failed nation because it was made to fail and it was made to fail because the colonial powers joined with the United States never forgave Haiti for the fact that overthrown slavery and in fact when you talk about the age of revolutions, the American revolution is mentioned, the French revolution is mentioned but the most significant one in the sense that they overthrew not only colonial rule but also slavery. That revolution, the Haitian revolution is never mentioned. It's sort of something which has fallen into oblivion and Haiti's representation as a failed country, as a consequence of the revolution has been completely wiped out from memory. We have wiped out the fact that the French extracted a huge indemnity from the Haitians because they freed themselves from being slaves and they had to pay the price of the slaves to France and they paid that for almost till I think till 1947. Huge drain in the 19th century that was 80% of Haiti's national income so that was the drain that was taken from them and the next 100 years, the 20th century from early 20th century onwards, it has been a de facto American colony or completely subservient America. Any president, any power which to seized Haiti's leadership, which did not count out to America was not allowed to last. So this is Haiti's position for the last 200 years and the consequences, it was handed over to NGOs with UN forces at one point. When the earthquake struck more than 300,000 people died, United Nations came in, then of course the United Nations peacekeepers also, it is claimed, brought in cholera into the country. So all of these consequences which Haiti faces today is a consequence of the revolt, the successful revolt of the slaves in Haiti and the fact that they were never forgiven for that with all the colonial powers ganging up against Haiti. Absolutely, right in that context the United States role also significant because Haiti is one of the classic examples of how the what is called the Monroe Doctrine was imposed over close to a century in terms of direct U.S. occupation as well, but also the dictatorships, so could you talk a bit about that as well? You know it's interesting, Monroe Doctrine initially did not involve the Caribbean's, so that's a later expansion in fact and of course it was a clear expansion that regarded the Caribbean as basically a part of their sphere of influence which others would not be allowed to contest. This is the neoclonial expansion of the United States which really takes place in the 20th century, started in the late 19th century but really in the 20th century when it extends its claims over the whole of Latin America as well as the Caribbean's. Now in this if you look at Haiti it was ruled, the Americans ruled it directly, they think under Woodrow Wilson they landed troops over there, see it's Haiti and ran it for about 20 years before handing it over to various quiz links of theirs including the infamous Papa dog Duavelier and baby dog his son who ruled it for I think about 20-25 years and this is one of the most brutal regimes anywhere in the world. Now all that is recorded but what is not recorded why did the US hand over Haiti to such a despised dictatorship and the answer is because they saw it as a base for against Cuba so therefore they were willing to have anything happen in Haiti as long as they could use it for the purpose of trying to bring down the Cuban revolutionary government so that is that is a in a short nutshell what happens in the 20th century but the interesting part is what happens in the 19th century. Could you first take us to the colonial aspect of the colonial how the colonial powers basically exploited Haiti because that seems to be a very integral part of how the of the current situation today including how the United States entered the fray. When the French set up Saint Domingo by that time the original population had been completely decimated Columbus and the Spaniards had taken care of that the really the decimation of the island populations in this one-third is in the French Saint Domingo the two-thirds was what becomes a Dominican Republic later but the Spaniards in this one third the first major plantation economy takes place and in fact Saint Domingo at that point of time was a largest sugar producer in the world as well as a major coffee producer and France its wealth came from Saint Domingo therefore the plantations were in some sense important for the development of capitalism in France and they did not therefore want to part with it when the Haitian slaves declared the essentially the same slogans as what led to the revolution the Rousseau revolution in France so that same declaration when they applied it to Haiti the French said the French whatever was the ruling parliament at that point of time said no no no that's for the French it's not for the Haitians it's not for the slaves slaves are inferior they have to win slaves their property so then led to a battle of independence and against slavery by the Haitians Napoleon sent 40,000 troops under one of his family members who lost and therefore in 1804 they had to cede power to the Haitian revolution having done that they did not recognize neither the United States in 1824 I think 24-25 they blockaded Haiti with warships supported by Jefferson who in fact said at one point that we cannot let the Haitian disease spread disease meaning of course freeing of the slaves because Jefferson himself was a slave owner as well as United States of course was a major slave owning nation so it's interesting Britain France United States was in war of a different kinds in North America but when it came to Haiti all three combined including of course the Spaniards as well to see that the slave revolt should not spread from Haiti and the what the did was to use reparations that your freed slaves one slave cost so much this is your debt to France for having freed the slaves and therefore you have to pay reparations and 80% of the national income of Haiti at that point went in the 19th century to pay the reparations then of course the 20th century which is direct US new colony so you replace France and with actually the United States but let's not forget this entire exercise was backed by all the colonial powers because that was the basis of the colonial empires first sugar then cotton and in the case of India and China as you know opium India was producing opium for subverting China and of course paying for all the imports the British would make from China thank you for being for talking to us that's all we have time for today keep watching