HAITI: Private Contractors 'Like Vultures Coming to Grab the Loot'

[cory777]

Source: IPS

By Anthony Fenton

VANCOUVER, Canada, Feb 19, 2010 (IPS) - Critics are concerned that private military contractors are positioning themselves at the centre of an emerging "shock doctrine" for earthquake-ravaged Haiti.

Next month, a prominent umbrella organisation for private military and logistic corporations, the International Peace Operations Association (IPOA), is co-organising a "Haiti summit" which aims to bring together "leading officials" for "private consultations with attending contractors and investors" in Miami, Florida.

Dubbed the "mercenary trade association" by journalist Jeremy Scahill, author of "Blackwater: the Rise of the World' Most Powerful Mercenary Army", the IPOA wasted no time setting up a "Haiti Earthquake Support" page on its website following the Jan. 12 earthquake that devastated the Caribbean country.

IPOA's director Doug Brooks says, "The first contacts we got were journalists looking for security when they went in." The website of IPOA member company, Hart Security, says they are currently in Haiti "supporting clients from the fields of media, consultancy and medical in their disaster recovery efforts." Several other IPOA members have either bid on or received contracts for work in Haiti.

Likewise, the private military contractor, Raidon Tactics, has at least 30 former U.S. Special Operations soldiers on the ground, where they have been guarding aid convoys and providing security for "news agencies," according to a Raidon employee who told IPS his company received over 1,000 phone calls in response to an ad posting "for open positions for Static Security Positions and Mobile Security Positions" in Haiti.

Just over a week following the earthquake, the IPOA teamed up with Global Investment Summits (GIS), a UK-based private company that specialises in bringing private contractors and government officials from "emerging post-conflict countries" together, to host an "Afghanistan Reconstruction Summit", in Istanbul, Turkey. It was there, says IPOA's director Doug Brooks, that the idea for the Haiti summit was hatched "over beers".

Read more: http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50396

[wilt the stilt]

1. Our country is a disgrace

the greed is unparalleled.

[defendandprotect]

2. kick

[Wilms]

3. .

[malaise]

4. Surprise,,surprise

NOT!

[amyrose2712]

5. +1

[IDemo]

6. Naomi Klein could have written this story before the earthquake

And did - http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine

[FlyByNight]

7. Textbook example of the Shock Doctrine

Can it be possible for the Haitian people to be even worse off? The mercenaries will see to that.

:mad: