18328: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Unrest (later story) (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By MICHAEL NORTON

   ST. MARC, Feb 8 (AP) -- Hundreds of Haitians looted TV sets, mattresses
and sacks of flour Sunday in this coastal town, one of several communities
seized by armed rebels in a bloody uprising against President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide.
   Using felled trees, flaming tires and car chassis, residents blocked the
streets into St. Marc, a day after rebels drove out police in gunbattles
that killed two people. Many residents in the area have formed neighborhood
groups to back insurgents in their push to expel the president.
   "After Aristide leaves, the country will return to normal," said Axel
Philippe, 34, among dozens massed on the highway leading to St. Marc, a
city of 100,000 some 45 miles northwest of the capital, Port-au-Prince.
   At least 18 people have been killed since armed rebels began their
assault four days ago, setting police stations on fire and driving officers
from the key city of Gonaives along the Caribbean Sea and several smaller
nearby towns.
   Anger has been brewing in Haiti since Aristide's party won flawed
legislative elections in 2000. The opposition refuses to join in any new
vote unless the president resigns; he insists on serving out his term,
ending in 2006.
   Clashes between government opponents and police and Aristide supporters
have killed at least 69 people since mid-September, when political violence
erupted in the Caribbean nation.
   In the bloodiest fights of recent days, 150 police tried to retake
control of the city of Gonaives on Saturday but were driven out by rebels.
At least nine people were killed, seven of them police, in gunbattles with
rebels hiding on side streets and crouched in doorways.
   Crowds mutilated and beat the corpses of three police officers. One body
was dragged through the street as a man swung at it with a machete, and a
woman cut off the officer's ear. Another policeman was lynched and stripped
to his shorts, and residents dropped a large rock on his body.
   Haitian radio stations reported claims by other rebels that as many as
14 police were killed, but that couldn't be confirmed.
   Rebels continued to rule the streets of Gonaives on Sunday, though its
unclear how many armed militants were the city of 200,000, Haiti's
fourth-largest.
   Calling the violence acts of terrorism, the government has vowed to
regain control of the area, but it was unclear when police planned to
return.
   Militants attacked police stations in at least five small towns near
Gonaives since Friday, Haitian radio reports said. Judge Walter Pierre told
private Radio Ginen that armed men were occupying the police station in the
town of Anse Rouge on Saturday.
   A number of people in both Gonaives and St. Marc said they formed
neighborhood committees to aid the militants and keep watch over their
areas.
   The recent violence started Thursday when rebels, calling themselves the
Gonaives Resistance Front, took control of the Gonaives police station
during a five-hour gunbattle. They set fire to buildings -- including the
mayor's house -- and freed more than 100 prisoners from city jails. Those
clashes left at least seven dead and 20 injured.