The South African Civil Society Information Service

Leaked WikiLeaks Cables Expose US Suppression of Minimum Wage in Haiti

28 Jun 2011

Drawing on almost 2,000 classified U.S. diplomatic cables on Haiti released by WikiLeaks, a partnership between The Nation magazine and the Haitian weekly, Haïti Liberté, exposes new details on how Fruit of the Loom, Hanes and Levi’s worked with the United States to block an increase in the minimum wage in the hemisphere’s poorest nation, how business owners and members of the country’s elite used Haiti’s police force as their own private army after the 2004 U.S.-backed coup that ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and how the United States, the European Union and the United Nations supported Haiti’s recent presidential and parliamentary elections, despite concerns over the exclusion of Haiti’s largest opposition party, Lavalas, the party of Aristide.

Democracy Now speaks with the reports’ authors, longtime Haiti correspondent Dan Coughlin and Haïti Liberté editor, Kim Ives.

For a transcript of the interview, please visit Democracy Now.

Editor's Note: You might also be interested in WikiLeaks Cables Reveal "Secret History" of U.S. Bullying in Haiti at Oil Companies’ Behest

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