a1918: Haitian Police Station Attacked, One Killed (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: A Wellington <souve64@hotmail.com>

Haitian Police Station Attacked, One Killed
By Michael Deibert

PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 2 (Reuters) Gunmen attacked a
provincial police station in the town of Belladere
early Wednesday morning, Haitian National Police
spokesman Jean Dady Simeon said Thursday.

“The station was attacked by gunmen, who seized
weapons and killed a bystander,” Simeon said, adding
that the town's ciy hall had also been set ablaze.

Police identified the dead man as Jean Brochette, a
local coordinator for Haitian President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide’s Lavalas Family political party.

Simeon said there had been no arrests, but sources
close to the police identified one of the attackers as
Winson Salomon, a former chaffeur and bodyguard to
exiled Port-au-Prince police chief Michel Francois.

Francois, one of the driving forces behind a coup that
ousted Aristide during his first term as president in
1991, went into exile upon Aristide's 1994.

The incident at Belladere, a small town on the
Dominican border, was an ominous echo of attacks
against police stations around Haiti last July, which
resulted in the deaths of four policemen, and wounded
a dozen more.

The attack also comes five months after
heavily-armed gunmen stormed the National Palace in an
apparent attempt to oust Aristide, setting of day-long
rioting that saw 13 dead and the burning and
destruction of homes and headquarters affiliated with
Aristide’s domestic opposition, the Democratic
Convergence coalition.

Aristide and the Convergence have been locked in an
electoral dispute for two years, stemming from
controversial May 2000 legislative elections which the
opposition charge were tabulated to favor Lavalas. The
dispute has resulted in the suspension of $500 million
of international aid.

Privately, government officials concede that it is
unlikely that the Convergence was involved in the July
and December attacks, instead pointing to former
members of Haiti’s disbanded military and paramilitary
organizations residing in the Dominican Republic.
Several former soldiers, including Guy Philippe,
former police chief for the northern Haitian city of
Cap Haitien, are currently in custody there for
alleged involvement in the December palace raid.




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