Swedish diplomat: US official confirms cholera outbreak in Haiti started with UN troops
By Kevin Pina & Jean Ristil
Thursday, November 18, 2010
http://haitiinformationproject.blogspot.com/2010/11/swedish-diplomat-us-official-confirms.html
Yesterday the story broke in the Scandinavian press that a Swedish Ambassador had finally confirmed what angry protesters have suspected along, the cholera epidemic in Haiti was imported by the Nepalese contingent of the United Nations.
The Swedish daily Svenska Dagbladets interviewed the Swedish Ambassador to the Caribbean, Claes Hammar who stated, "Unfortunately that is the case. It has proved that the cholera came from Nepal." When pressed for his source Hammar replied, "a diplomatic source. It is 100 per cent true. Tests were made and the source was traced to Nepal."
The Helsinki daily HELSINGIN SANOMAT followed up with a second interview where Hammar gave more details about his source, “I consider my source to be a reliable one. It is a US official, but I cannot say who.” HELSINGIN SANOMAT added that Hammar told them the tests taken by the US official were "at a camp of Nepalese UN workers."
This new information follows two days of denials by the UN who have accused protesters in Haiti of trying to destabilize the country before much touted elections. Three protesters were killed by UN troops in Haiti's second largest city of Cap Haitien over the past three days. Adding to growing frustration over the UN's denial of the source of the cholera epidemic in Haiti are their recent statements that protesters were shot by "local gangs " and not UN troops in Cap Haitien. A Haitian journalist interviewed yesterday in Cap Haitien via telephone commented, "The UN has lost all credibility. Rather than showing people they are accountable and taking responsibility they react with guns and then lie about it. People no longer believe anything they say."
Anger also spilled into Haiti's capital of Port au Prince yesterday with roving bands of demonstrators burning tires and ripping down election posters belonging to candidates of current president Rene Preval's INITE party.
The UN is bracing itself for more demonstrations today in Port au Prince and Cap Haitien. Today's protests have special significance in Haiti as they mark the 207th anniversary of the Battle of Vetieres where General Jean-Jacques Dessalines led an army of former slaves to defeat the French. Winning this crucial battle led to the establishment of the world's first black republic, the Republic of Haiti, on January 1, 1804.
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Excerpt from: U.S. Government Strategy for Addressing the Cholera Outbreak in Haiti
http://www.state.gov/p/wha/rls/rm/2010/151148.htm
DR. MENON: As was mentioned, there’s a couple aspects. One, after the earthquake, with the displacing over 2.3 million people, it created a population that was internally displaced, which is a known risk factor for cholera.
QUESTION: You mean that – you mean cholera can just appear magically? It doesn’t have to be introduced by anything?
DR. MENON: No, I’m not saying that. I’m saying the displaced people contributed to its – the spread that we’re seeing now.
QUESTION: Right, well, but as you’ve said all along, I mean, Haiti has confronted one disaster after another for the last God knows how many years.
DR. MENON: Right.
QUESTION: And this hasn’t happened before. So, I mean, there have been populations moved around Haiti and living in crowded, unsanitary conditions for a hundred years.
DR. MENON: That’s correct.
QUESTION: So what was – so something had to introduce the –
DR. MENON: Well, that’s absolutely correct. But two things. One, we don’t know how the surveillance system prior to the earthquake would have even detected this case. The laboratory capacity and the epidemiological surveillance is heightened now, post-earthquake, through the help of partners.
QUESTION: Okay, I’ll stop after this, but I just –
DR. MENON: I will address your question now. Specifically, how the organism was introduced, we don’t know. I mean, it’s very difficult, through the spread of infectious diseases, where the strain of this organism came from, how it got there, what the origin was. We will never know that answer.