18407: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Uprising (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By IAN JAMES

   CAP-HAITIEN, Feb 10 (AP) -- Armed loyalists of President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide set up blazing barricades Tuesday, vowing to attack rebels leading
a bloody uprising that has spread to at least 11 towns and cost 42 lives.
   Brandishing pistols, bands of drunken youths manned barricades and threw
rocks at passing cars in the northern port city of Cap-Haitien. They said
they were protecting the half-million residents of Haiti's second-largest
city, a former Aristide stronghold where support has dwindled as poverty
increases.
   "The opposition doesn't want to deal with Aristide, so we know we are
going to have to fight them," said Jesner Jean, 28, pacing along a
barricade of boulders and garbage.
   Roadblocks have prevented food deliveries to tens of thousands of hungry
Haitians, the U.N. World Food Program warned from Geneva, and fuel tankers
also were blocked. Some gas stations have run out of fuel.
   Police have regained control in three of the 11 towns, but the unrest
has taken a heavy toll.
   Aristide partisans were searching for rebels but also lashed out at
members of the opposition coalition in Cap-Haitien.
   Remy Charlot, 44, said Aristide militants gutted his restaurant
overnight. "Because I criticize the government, that's why they burned my
restaurant," he told The Associated Press. "They came inside. They poured
gasoline on all my stuff and they burned it."
   After sporadic gunbattles Monday, police regained control of the port
city of St. Marc, 45 miles west of Port-au-Prince, and nearby Grand-Goave.
At least two men were shot in St. Marc and another was allegedly shot and
killed by Aristide supporters, who left the headless body at the roadside.
   At Dondon, 12 miles outside Cap-Haitien, police helped by a pro-Aristide
militia managed to fight off rebels Monday and regain control of the town,
officials said. Aristide supporters then torched houses of nine
anti-government activists there, Radio Vision 2000 reported.
   The uprising began Thursday in Haiti's fourth-largest city, Gonaives,
presenting a dangerous turning point in Haiti's three-year political
crisis. A similar revolt in 1985 also started in Gonaives and led to the
downfall of the 29-year Duvalier family dictatorship.
   Opposition politicians and civilians distanced themselves from the
revolt, denying government contentions they were uniting with the rebels to
stage a coup. "Our means are peaceful," opposition leader Evans Paul said
after a meeting Monday of the Democratic Platform, made up of political
groups, civic leaders, clergy and students.
   The United States was "pushing very hard for an end to violence," State
Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday. He said the Bush
administration was urging government leaders and the opposition to accept
help from the Caribbean Community.
   Last month, Trinidad's leader Patrick Manning said Caribbean nations
were ready to send peacekeepers to Haiti, but Aristide's government
rebuffed the offer.
   "There's been altogether too much violence in Haiti's history," Boucher
said.
   Tolls put together from witnesses, Red Cross officials, rebel leaders
and radio reports indicate at least 42 people, including policemen, have
been killed in the uprising.
   Haiti has suffered more than 30 coups in 200 years, the last in 1991
when Aristide was ousted just months after becoming the Caribbean nation's
first freely elected leader. President Clinton sent 20,000 U.S. troops in
1994 to restore Aristide, who then abolished the army.
   Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday the U.S. military has "no
plans to do anything" in Haiti.
   With fewer than 5,000 poorly armed police, the government force has been
outgunned and outnumbered. Numerous police stations have been torched
because officers are accused of siding with Aristide supporters in protests
that began in mid-September. Dozens have been killed since then in clashes
with police and Aristide partisans.
   Tension has mounted since Aristide's party won flawed legislative
elections in 2000 and international donors blocked millions of dollars in
aid. Misery has deepened, with most of the nation's 8 million people
unemployed and living on less than $1 a day despite election promises from
Aristide, a former priest who had vowed to bring dignity to the poor.
   In Cap-Haitien, Thaniel Toussaint, 24, vowed to fight for Aristide and
said, clutching a pistol in his trouser pocket, "We're not going to be
afraid."