#4825: U.N. mission member wounded in Haiti dies (fwd)

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From:nozier@tradewind.net

Posted at 1:16 p.m. EDT Wednesday, August 9, 2000 
 U.N. mission member wounded in Haiti dies

 MIAMI -- (AP) -- A U.N. mission member who was shot in the head during
a robbery attempt in Haiti died today in Miami, hours after being flown
here for emergency medical care. Garfield Lyle of Guyana was taken off
life support at 12:05 a.m., said Lorraine Nelson, a Jackson Memorial
Hospital spokeswoman. Lyle, 52, was in a coma when brought to the
hospital Tuesday and never recovered. He was apparently caught in
crossfire during a robbery attempt late Monday in the Haitian capital,
Port-Au-Prince, U.N. deputy spokesman Manoel de Almeida e
 Silva said. Lyle was at the wheel of his white all-terrain vehicle
marked with the U.N. insignia, said Daniel Amiot-Priso, press attache
for the U.N. International Civilian Support Mission in Haiti. Witnesses
said the gunmen had been chasing another vehicle in their car and
 Lyle's vehicle apparently blocked their pursuit. The bullet penetrated
the windshield and struck Lyle, who was alone in the vehicle, in the
right eye. In an upsurge of violent crime, gunmen have shot and killed
about 15 people in the metropolitan area this month. ``He was in the
wrong place at the wrong time,'' said Amiot-Priso, who said he
 believed the Lyle shooting was unrelated to the turbulent electoral
process, the results of which have been questioned by the international
community. In Haiti since August 1998, Lyle was in charge of the U.N.
fleet of vehicles. He was the first U.N. employee attacked since the
more than 40-member unarmed, ununiformed U.N. mission took over from the
previous U.N. police training mission in March. The current mission,
which is not yet fully deployed, includes technical assistance to the
police and human rights monitoring. The Haitian force was established in
1995 to replace a corrupt army that killed as many as 4,000 people.
Legislative and local elections in May, June and July were supposed to
restore constitutional government to Haiti. But foreign donors and the
United Nations criticized the formula used to calculate winners. The
formula gave former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's party control of
the Senate. Aristide's party also has won overwhelming control of
Parliament's House of Deputies and most city and rural councils.