BOB GARFIELD: From WNYC in New York, this is NPR's On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: And I'm Brooke Gladstone. Chaos sweeps across Haiti as armed groups that oppose the government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide attack police stations and take over large portions of the country. Reporters are attacked, shot, their stations and offices wrecked and torched. Journalists there have long been victims of political strife. Michelle Montas, former director of Radio Haiti International, has been living in the United States since early last year. Her husband, journalist Jean Dominique, was killed in 2000. When we spoke to her last year, she'd just left Haiti after the murder of her bodyguard. Threats on her life and the lives of her co-workers forced her to shut her station down. But she remains in close contact with her colleagues back home. She says the situation there is far worse than when she left.

MICHELLE MONTAS: We have had this year only from January until today about 50 aggressions against the press compared to 30 last year. I think right now it's getting even difficult for foreign journalists covering the events in Haiti, because a lot of local groups, armed groups are taking now foreign journalists as targets. So they would take cameras and they would destroy equipment or attack journalists as was the case for Mexican journalists this past week.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:Let's talk about the impact on the coverage. I guess most of the television has been bought up by the government except for one cable channel, and much of the radio is pro-opposition. Does it strike you that everybody is taking sides over there?

MICHELLE MONTAS: Oh, well definitely. I think this is what has been obvious in the media landscape recently, is that the majority of journalists or media are taking sides. You listen to radio, particularly early in the morning, to know where you go, and it is obvious that right now the reports can be pretty biased on one side or the other, particularly when covering demonstrations. You have some incredible discrepancies in numbers. You will have a pro-government media saying, you know, we had one million people in the streets supporting Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and you would have an opposition media saying there are only 5,000. And I think this goes also pretty far in terms of putting the events in perspective with the arrival of the rebel groups in the northern part of the country. You have had a situation where among the former soldiers or former militia members you have people who are convicted felons, and the media will let them speak over the microphones without saying that these people had been convicted of this crime or that crime. The lack of perspective I think is a disservice to the population to the extent that you have very young people out in the streets demonstrating for one side or taking arms for the other side, and they don't know who they are dealing with.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Is there any outlet, then, that the public can trust to help keep them safe and out of the line of fire?

MICHELLE MONTAS:In terms of the line of fire, I think you have pretty much an agreement whether they are pro-opposition or pro-government, the media agree to tell you that you have barricades in the streets in this corner or that corner, and that there are violent events taking place here or there. Of course, one side would accuse the opposition. The other side would accuse the government. But at least you will know, whichever one you listen to, where the violence is and the fact that there is violence.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: So principally where are you getting your news from Haiti?

MICHELLE MONTAS:Well, I'm getting it from all sources, whether it be the coverage of the French press, the coverage by the American press or other sources of information by journalists covering the situation in Haiti.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: What do you make of the coverage of the Haitian crisis that you've seen here in the United States?

MICHELLE MONTAS:The majority of what I've read I think has been pretty fair. However I think that a number of situations are not put into context, and a number of questions are not asked. One of them is that how do 200 people with weapons, heavy weapons, cross the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic? Who is their support? Who is behind them? Particularly that those people in exile, and they had been behind the coup d'etat of '91-'94.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: So these are men from the previous dictatorship that came in to join the opposition.

MICHELLE MONTAS:Actually they have not joined the opposition. They have their own agenda. I think we should separate the armed opposition that has emerged recently from the political opposition that really was for the most part a peaceful movement. They are different oppositions.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: So that's one question not being asked and some contexts not being explored. Are there others?

MICHELLE MONTAS:Yes. For instance, I don't think much has been said about why have we reached a point of almost chaos? The press hasn't gone enough behind the scene to find out the reason for what's happening today. Journalists have a tendency to bring things back to elections, as if everything was linked to elections. I don't think this is the issue. I think the issue is the fact that so many people in Haiti had put their hope on the Aristide government, and that government has failed them.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:There have been increasing attacks against foreign journalists. If the danger gets so great that the foreign press leave and a blanket of silence falls over Haiti, what then?

MICHELLE MONTAS: Oh, I think, I think it would be a disaster. The fact that the press has looked over and seen what was happening in Haiti, that so many correspondents went down to Port-au-Prince to try to find out, or to Cap-Haitien or to Gonaives to try to find out what was happening I think is a determining factor in shaping the policy, U.S. policy towards Haiti, in shaping also the policy of France. Right now in French media, Haiti is front page news, which was not the case for years. Haiti was completely forgotten, and I think right now we rely a lot on what is being said by so many journalists being down in Haiti right now and covering the events. I think it's our lifeline.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Okay. Michelle Montas, thank you so much.

MICHELLE MONTAS: Thank you.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Michelle Montas is the news director of Radio Haiti International. She currently resides in the United States.

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