March, 08 2012, 03:35pm EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Dan Beeton, 202-239-1460
Bill Clinton's Admission of UN Responsibility for Haiti's Cholera Epidemic is a Welcome Step Forward, CEPR Co-Director Says
UN Should Now Get Rid of the Disease that it Brought by Building the Infrastructure for Clean Water and Sanitation
WASHINGTON
UN Special Envoy to Haiti Bill Clinton's admission yesterday that a "UN peacekeeping soldier from South Asia" had "introduced cholera into Haiti" is an important first step toward accountability for this disaster, Mark Weisbrot, Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) said. President Clinton's comments represent the first public acknowledgement of responsibility from a senior UN official, and follow over a year of official UN denials -- despite a number of scientific studies that have shown that UN troops brought the bacteria.
"President Clinton's acknowledgement, as a UN official, should bring us one step closer to the UN taking responsibility for what it has done, and fixing it." Weisbrot said.
"The deaths and disease from the cholera in Haiti will only be eliminated, as they were from Latin America after the 1991 outbreak, when Haiti has adequate drinking water and sanitation," said Weisbrot. "Since the UN brought this disease to Haiti - through its own carelessness - it is now the United Nations' responsibility to provide this infrastructure."
Weisbrot added that the international community, especially the United States, which brought UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) troops to Haiti, must share in that responsibility.
Clinton made the remarks in response to questions from independent journalist Ansel Herz regarding the origins of the cholera epidemic that has killed over 7,000 people and infected more than half-a-million.
"I don't know that the person who introduced cholera into Haiti, the UN peacekeeping soldier from South Asia was aware that he was carrying the virus," Clinton says in audio that Herz recorded at a press conference. "It was the proximate cause of cholera. That is, he was carrying the cholera strain; it came from his waste stream into the waterways of Haiti and into the bodies of Haitians."
Although senior UN officials have previously attempted to attribute the epidemic to other causes, an independent panel that prepared a report [PDF] for the UN also found that UN troops were most likely responsible. One of the authors of the report, Daniele Lantagne, said "The most likely scenario is that someone associated with the UN MINUSTAH facility was the person responsible," in an interview with Aljazeera posted online yesterday.
Other studies published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the New England Journal of Medicine, and the most definitive study by 15 scientists last August, all reached the same conclusion as to the origin of the bacteria.
Earlier this week, U.S. Permanent Representative to the UN Susan Rice called on the UN to take responsibility for the outbreak, urging it to "redouble its efforts to prevent any further incidents of this kind and to ensure that those responsible are held accountable."
"Clinton's remarks are reminiscent of his mea culpa for harmful food aid practices that devastated Haiti's agricultural sector," Weisbrot said. "In that case the damage was already done. But cholera, if the international community doesn't take urgent steps, will kill many more people and could be endemic to Haiti for a long time. If the UN took responsibility right now it could ramp up treatment and prevention and compensate victims, and the end of the story could be very different.
"This is all the more urgent as the rainy season begins in Haiti," Weisbrot added. "Cholera incidence rises and declines with the rainy and dry seasons, respectively. It's important now that everyone does everything they can to prevent, mitigate, and treat cholera now, or we will see a lot more lives lost.
The Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) was established in 1999 to promote democratic debate on the most important economic and social issues that affect people's lives. In order for citizens to effectively exercise their voices in a democracy, they should be informed about the problems and choices that they face. CEPR is committed to presenting issues in an accurate and understandable manner, so that the public is better prepared to choose among the various policy options.
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Uproar in Italy as Fascist Government Attacks Right of Same-Sex Parents to Adopt
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Hundreds of people hit the streets of Milan, Italy on Saturday to protest the far-right government's assault on the parental rights of same-sex couples.
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Surrounded by students, teachers, and advocates, Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Friday afternoon signed into law a bill to provide breakfast and lunch at no cost to all of the state's roughly 820,000 K-12 pupils regardless of their household income.
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During Friday's signing ceremony, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan (DFL) said, "To our decision-makers who believe they have never met someone who is experiencing or has experienced hunger: Hi, my name is Peggy Flanagan, and I was 1 in 6 of those Minnesota children who experienced hunger."
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As Minnesota Reformerreported: "The majority of Minnesota schools receive federal funding from the National School Lunch Program, which reimburses schools for each meal served, though it doesn't cover the cost of the entire meal. Under the new law, schools are prohibited from charging students for the remaining cost, and the state will foot the rest of the bill—about $200 million annually."
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Last month, The Star Tribune editorial board opined that providing free breakfast and lunch to all of Minnesota's students, including affluent ones, is "excessive."
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Former U.S. President Donald Trump claimed Saturday on his social media platform that he "will be arrested" on Tuesday and implored his supporters to "protest" and "take our nation back," sparking fears of additional right-wing violence.
Trump's call to action was reminiscent of how, six weeks after losing the 2020 presidential election, he took to Twitter to urge his supporters to join a "big protest" in Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021. "Be there, will be wild!" he wrote. Hundreds of far-right insurrectionists showed up and, after Trump told them to march from a rally near the White House to the Capitol, stormed the halls of Congress in a bid to prevent lawmakers from certifying President Joe Biden's win. Multiple people died as a result of the failed coup, which was fueled by Trump and his Republican allies' incessant lies about voter fraud.
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Just before 7:30 am ET on Saturday, Trump baselessly declared on Truth Social: "Illegal leaks from a corrupt and highly political Manhattan district attorney's office... indicate that, with no crime being able to be proven... the far and away leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States of America will be arrested on Tuesday of next week. Protest, take our nation back!"
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Early Saturday morning, there was little evidence yet that Mr. Trump's new demand for protests had been embraced by extremist groups.
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After the FBI in early August searched Trump's Mar-a-Lago palace and removed boxes of documents as part of a federal probe into the ex-president's handling of classified materials, many anonymous and some well-known reactionaries called for "civil war" on Twitter, patriots.win, and elsewhere.
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Meanwhile, Trump continued to lie about the Mar-a-Lago search on Truth Social, sparking an "unprecedented" surge in threats against FBI personnel and facilities.
As Dáte noted on Saturday morning, many people downplayed warnings issued ahead of the January 6 assault.
"Many of Trump's core supporters want authoritarianism," the journalist tweeted. "They believe in neither democracy nor the rule of law."
As the Times reported:
Although prosecutors working for the [Manhattan] district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, have signaled that an indictment of Mr. Trump could be imminent, there was no immediate indication as to why the former president appeared confident that he would be arrested Tuesday. People with knowledge of the matter have said that at least one more witness is expected to testify in front of the grand jury, which could slightly delay any indictment.
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Trump is expected to be charged in connection with payments his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, made to silence adult film actress Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal—both of whom alleged affairs with Trump—in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election.
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Trump has so far evaded charges but that could soon change, as prosecutors are expected to accuse Trump of greenlighting the false recording of expenses in his company's internal records.
Citing five unnamed officials familiar with the matter, NBC Newsreported Friday that local, state, and federal law enforcement and security agencies are preparing for the possibility of a Trump indictment as early as next week.
If indicted, Trump would become the first U.S. president to face criminal charges in or out of office. Trump, who has denied all wrongdoing, says that he will keep campaigning regardless of whether he is arrested.
The Manhattan D.A.'s hush money probe is just one of Trump's many legal woes. The twice-impeached president is also facing a state-level criminal investigation in Georgia over his efforts to overturn that state's 2020 election results, as well as federal probes into his coup attempt and his handling of classified government documents.
Nevertheless, Trump is still seen as the front-runner to win the GOP's 2024 nomination.
David Aronberg, the state attorney for Palm Beach County, Florida, said Saturday morning that if Trump is indicted in New York, "there will be protests here," warning: "You have to worry about potential violence."
He pointed out that questions remain as to whether Trump would surrender to New York authorities or face extradition. Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, another authoritarian demagogue who is widely considered Trump's leading rival for the GOP's 2024 nomination, "has to sign off [any] extradition orders," said Aronberg.
The Times noted that if "Trump is arraigned, he will almost certainly be released without spending any time behind bars because the indictment is likely to contain only nonviolent felony charges."
However, The Associated Pressreported that it is not clear when the other investigations into Trump "will end or whether they might result in criminal charges."
"But they will continue regardless of what happens in New York," the outlet explained, "underscoring the ongoing gravity—and broad geographic scope—of the legal challenges confronting the former president."
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