18380: Esser: Haitian gov't bogged down in crisis (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com


Haitian gov't bogged down in crisis after three years in power

www.chinaview.cn
2004-02-10 11:34:39

    HAVANA, Feb. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- The second administration of
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide is bogged down in a political crisis
after it completed three years in power on Saturday and no official
celebrations were held because of violent protests throughout the
country.

    Just a few hours ahead of the anniversary, the opposition took
control of Gonaives, which is 110 km northwest of the capital city of
Port-au-Prince and the fourth most important city of the impoverished
nation. At least 26 people were killed in clashes between police and
the rebels and 14 deaths took place on Saturday.

    Gonaives, which has 200,000 inhabitants, is now ruled by the
self-proclaimed mayor and leader of the Revolutionary Artibonite
Resistance Front, Winter Etienne, who said his supporters have put the
city under absolute control.

    "What happened in Gonaives is only the beginning and it will
expand to all the country," Jean Pierre, a member of the opposition
coalition of the Democratic Platform, told the press on Saturday.

    The crisis reached the town of San Marcos, 100 km northwest of
Port-au-Prince, and hundreds of people looted shipping containers in
the town. Members of an opposition group known as RAMICOS claimed to
have taken control of the town, which has a population of 100,000.

    Prime Minister Yvon Neptune accused opposition groups on Sunday of
trying to mount a coup to overthrow the government. He said that only
through elections can the crisis be resolved.

    Witnesses reportedly heard sporadic gunfire in San Marco on
Monday and saw palls of black smoke rising from burning
barricadeserected across the city.

    Police tried but failed to beat back RAMICOS that burned the city
police station on Saturday.

    Also on Monday, an uprising spread in western Haiti with
anti-government groups seizing at least nine towns in that area and
thedeath toll in the clashes has risen to more than 40.

    Aristide, the country's first elected president, is accused of
election cheat in the 2000 presidential elections. His popularity
plummeted amid a worsening economy and charges of corruption and poor
governance. But Aristide insists that he would hold office until his
term expires in 2006.

    Elected as president for the first time in 1990, Aristide was
ousted in a military coup on Sept. 30, 1991, and forced into an exile
that ended in 1994 with the support of US troops.

    He returned to Haiti in October 1994 and regained the presidency
he had won in 1990, becoming the first democratically elected leader
in Haiti after Jean-Claude Duvalier's dictatorship.

    In November 2000, Aristide won the elections with 90 percent
ofthe votes without a challenging rival.

    Since September 2003, clashes between Aristide supporters and
opponents have claimed at least 69 lives and wounded hundreds.
The political crisis escalated in November when the government and
the opposition failed to reach an agreement on an electoral council
to organize new elections.

    Haiti's parliament stopped running on Jan. 13, after the term of
83 representatives and two-thirds of the 27 senators expired.

    The Caribbean Community (Caricom) was trying to mediate and last
Thursday a mission of the bloc held meetings with both Aristide and
his opponents.

    The mission's first result was the immediate lift of the
prohibition of public demonstrations by the government.

    The government banned public protests which triggered the
disturbances that ended in a rebellion in Gonaives.

    The riots were also condemned in a series of declarations by the
United Nations and the US Embassy in Haiti.

    UN chief Kofi Annan called upon all Haitians to "resolve their
differences peacefully and through constitutional means" and
expressed his support for Caricom in seeking a peaceful solution to
the political crisis.

    The US Embassy in Port-au-Prince said last Friday that the United
States is against establishing a new regime through violent measures
and will support mediation by Caricom to resolve the current crisis.

    Haiti, a country of 8 million people in the eastern Caribbean
Sea, has suffered repeated civil wars and dictatorships as well astwo
US invasions since its independence 200 years ago.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-02/10/content_1307174.htm