ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, October 3, 1996 TAG: 9610030021
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
EXPERTS ON HAITIAN POLITICS say Rep. Sonny Bono made false claims during his visit to Roanoke.
When he came to Roanoke Monday night, Rep. Sonny Bono entertained a Republican crowd with quips about his former TV career and his current political adventures, and brought roars of laughter when he joked that a speech-interrupting cellular phone call was his psychiatrist trying to track him down.
But the California congressman ended his speech by turning serious: He called President Clinton "a criminal" and charged that Clinton has Central Intelligence Agency hit squads in Haiti to keep that country's U.S.-backed leader in office.
Several journalists and academics who follow Haitian politics question Bono's grasp of what's going on in that island nation.
"My first reaction is: I don't know what Sonny's been smoking," said Kal Wagenheim, who publishes Caribbean Update, a monthly U.S.-based newsletter that covers Haiti. "My second reaction is that he's just trying to make political, partisan attacks."
"This guy saying this is just incredible," said Bernard Diederich, a former Time magazine bureau chief who has written books about Third World dictators and assassinations.
Diederich said the evidence is that the CIA has not been involved in assassinations since the 1970s.
During his speech, Bono said, "We have a hit squad in Haiti. You know what the CIA does - they kill people."
Afterward, Bono conceded that he had no proof, but said "it's there" in government documents the Democrats are refusing to release. "If you can get the memos," he said, "let us know."
On Wednesday, Bono's press secretary didn't back away from the former entertainer's comments, but he did try to soften them.
Bono gets many briefings on foreign intelligence matters, spokesman Frank Cullen said, and he may have heard a "hypothetical" situation and taken it "a step beyond that" in his speech.
"It's possible that he was making a statement that was maybe a bit stronger than the corroborating evidence at this time," Cullen said. "Perhaps he could have been more circumspect" or said "it's been alleged."
Wagenheim, the Caribbean Update publisher, said Bono's comments are "irresponsible for a congressman. A congressman's words are supposed to carry weight."
"I follow Haiti on a daily basis," he said. "I don't know what this guy is talking about. He's really obviously a lightweight guy - to make those kinds of baseless allegations. I can't think of any responsible Republicans who would ever say anything like that."
Locksley Edmondson, a Cornell University political scientist and president of the Caribbean Studies Association, said he hasn't been updated on what's going on in Haiti in the past week, but, "On the face of it, it strikes me as an extraordinarily irresponsible statement."
Haiti was ruled for decades by "Papa Doc" Duvalier and then by his son, "Baby Doc." Jean-Bertrand Aristide won Haiti's presidency via democratic elections in 1990, but was ousted by a military coup.
President Clinton sent U.S. armed forces into Haiti in 1994 to help restore Aristide to office. In December, Rene Preval was elected to succeed Aristide.
Since then, Diederich said, two politicians supportive of the former military dictatorship have been killed, and some authorities suspect that members of Preval's security force played a role.
Diederich and Wagenheim said Preval's response has been to try to clean up his security unit, and the U.S. State Department has sent in members of its diplomatic security team to help protect Preval.
Rather than backing assassinations, "it's just the opposite," Wagenheim said. "I think they're trying to prevent people from getting killed."
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines KEYWORDS: POLITICS CONGRESSby CNB