18298: (Chamberlain) Anti-Aristide gunmen say control Haitian city (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Gunmen opposed to Haiti's
embattled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide proclaimed themselves on Friday
in charge of the poor Caribbean country's fourth largest city and said they
would only hand over their arms if Aristide stepped down.
     Government spokesman Mario Dupuy said the authorities intended to
re-establish order in Gonaives, in the north of the country, where former
members of the once pro-Aristide Cannibal Army militia attacked a police
station on Thursday.
     Up to five bystanders were killed in the ensuing shootout, according
to radio reports. The Haitian National Police officers fled.
     "As the self-proclaimed mayor of Gonaives, we ... present an ultimatum
to President Aristide to leave the country," Wynter Etienne, a spokesman
for the group called Artibonite Resistance, told independent Radio
Metropole.
     He said the rebels intended to move on to other cities in the north of
the poorest country in the Americas, including Cap-Haitien, Haiti's
second-largest city.
     The extent of the group's control over Gonaives was not clear.
     The gunmen once belonged to the Cannibal Army, which had supported
Aristide but turned against him when its leader, Amiot Metayer, was killed
in September.
     Aristide, a former Roman Catholic priest now serving his second term
as president, has come under increasing pressure to resign. Opposition
groups accuse him of corruption and human rights violations.
     Aristide, who was ousted by a military coup during his first term but
restored to power in a U.S.-led invasion, has said he will serve out his
new term, which ends in 2006.