12530: NYTimes.com Article: At Impasse, Haiti's Leader Talks of Bypassing Opposition (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Dan Craig <dgcraig@att.net>

At Impasse, Haiti's Leader Talks of Bypassing Opposition
July 14, 2002
By DAVID GONZALEZ

PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti, July 13 - President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide of Haiti has proposed holding parliamentary
elections with outside monitors next year even if the
opposition rejects talks, saying he has made "major
sacrifices" to comply with international requirements to
end a political impasse.

Talks brokered by the Organization of American States this
week failed to produce an accord after the opposition
coalition, the Democratic Convergence, demanded guarantees
of security and prosecution of those who attacked them
during violent upheavals last July and December.

Hundreds of millions of dollars in badly needed foreign aid
has been suspended until a dispute is resolved over
parliamentary elections in May 2000. Mr. Aristide's Lavalas
Family party won an overwhelming majority in that vote,
which the opposition said was tainted.

In a rare interview, on Thursday at the National Palace,
Mr. Aristide said he had taken steps to improve security
and that he had agreed to halve the four-year terms of his
party's lawmakers. While he repeatedly insisted that he was
open to negotiating with the opposition, he said elections
might have to be held by next June to stop the country's
political free fall and to bring about the release of the
aid.

"It is logical for the O.A.S. to accept it," said Mr.
Aristide, who presented his proposal on Wednesday. "Before,
people could say they called upon the protagonists to sit
and negotiate an agreement. Now they cannot. It is evident
the opposition refuses. Period. Once that is evident, the
consequence is also logical."

Mr. Aristide is gambling that international groups and
nearby countries have grown weary of the stalemate.
Diplomats and others involved in the negotiations have
expressed frustration with the opposition, which is divided
over how to deal with Mr. Aristide. But a United States
government official warned that it was premature to think
that elections could be held without the opposition unless
Mr. Aristide moved beyond the piecemeal concessions of the
last two years.

"If there is a proposal from Lavalas Family that reasonable
people inside and outside of Haiti believe could be a
solution to the problem and Convergence walks away, then
the whole dynamic would change," said the official. "The
problem is Aristide moves by small steps. He says the
Convergence does not want an agreement. We say, put
something on the table to prove you are right."

The political aspects of the proposal are essentially the
same as those discussed last year with the opposition,
which came close to accepting it last July. But the
atmosphere changed after armed attacks on the police
academy and the National Palace last year resulted in
violent reprisals against the opposition by groups loyal to
Mr. Aristide.

The government had portrayed the assaults on the palace and
the academy as attempted coups. A recent report by the
Organization of American States concluded that they were
the result of the country's lawlessness, and it absolved
the opposition of involvement. The report was especially
critical of the government, saying that it was
unresponsive, that the courts were politicized and that a
lack of respect for human rights and the rule of law gave
thugs impunity.

As preconditions for talks, opposition leaders have said,
the government must prove it can provide for safe
elections, disarm the gangs and arrest those who ransacked
their offices, burned their homes and killed their
supporters last year. They submitted a proposal late last
week to the O.A.S. and suggested resuming talks if the
accord included more specific language on security issues.

"We think that if we do not focus on these things, it is
impossible to have an agreement," said Micha Gaillard, the
Convergence spokesman. "Our dispute is not an electoral
dispute. It began with an electoral dispute, but now it is
about the creation of a state of law for the next election.
We want some signs."

Mr. Aristide said in the interview that the government had
arrested one person accused of involvement in the violence
and that negotiators had agreed to compensate the victims.

However, diplomats and political opponents questioned why
that one suspect was transferred from the capital to a
prison in his hometown, Gonaïves, after violent protests by
gangs there. They said many more suspects remained free,
and they were worried about more violence.

Mr. Aristide said some Lavalas partisans were hard to
control. But he insisted they were not above the law, and
said Haiti's judicial system needed international help.

Still, he said his recent moves to resolve grievances over
past violence, combined with his willingness to form an
impartial electoral council, should show that he was not
intent on squashing the opposition.

"I will not stop or lose patience with the opposition," he
said. "They have the right to oppose, and I have an
obligation to insist."

For many Haitians who survive on less than a dollar a day,
life has become an unrelenting nightmare. He said health
care, living conditions and education had all suffered as a
result of what he called the "embargo" on foreign aid.
Major donors disagree, saying that aid continues to be
provided by charitable agencies.

Still, Mr. Aristide said the refusal to provide development
loans because of the political crisis had, for example,
kept 80 percent of the population without clean water,
increasing disease. The political impasse, he added, has
also scared away potential investors who could create jobs.

"It is time for the international community to unfreeze the
money which will allow eight million people to at least
start seeing something new," he said. "They have a right to
an education. They have a right to health care. We have
300,000 people affected by H.I.V. I have the right to hear
their voices."

A worsening of the situation could send another wave of
desperate Haitians on rafts toward Florida, Mr. Aristide
suggested. Opposition leaders and others have also
speculated that the United States may have a strong
interest in finding a solution to protect Gov. Jeb Bush,
the president's brother, who is running for re-election,
from such a development.

"Imagine the political situation worsens in Haiti, imagine
how many boat people you would have in Florida - who would
want that?" Mr. Aristide said. "Jeb and I, we are in the
same boat."

Opposition leaders also said, though, that Mr. Aristide had
mastered the art of sending dual messages. His remarks
about the danger of boat people, they said, could be seen
as a reminder to his American supporters that American
policy toward Haiti is tinged with racial fear.