18436: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Uprising (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By IAN JAMES

   CAP-HAITIEN, Feb 11 (AP) -- Vowing to keep rebels from advancing to
other Haitian cities, loyalists of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide blocked
roads with heaps of scrap metal, boulders and trees to stem a violent
uprising that has killed at least 42.
   Most of the country returned to relative calm Tuesday with Aristide
supporters looking to the battle ahead. Opponents refuse to participate in
new elections unless Aristide steps down.
   "We're going to devour them," said Jean-Claude Joseph, 35, standing arms
crossed at a barricade with more than a dozen others at Cap-Haitien, the
nation's second-largest city.
   The State Department authorized the departure of family members and
non-emergency employees of the U.S. Embassy even though most of the country
was unaffected by the uprising. The U.S. government also issued a travel
warning to private citizens, although few tourists travel to Haiti.
   Roadblocks had prevented food deliveries to tens of thousands in the
north, the U.N. World Food Program warned from Geneva, and fuel tankers
were blocked. Some gas stations already have run out of fuel in
Cap-Haitien, although the capital, Port-au-Prince, remained unaffected.
   In some areas where gunbattles had died down, neither police nor rebels
were present. In the northern town of Ennery, young men played soccer in
front of its charred police station, abandoned days earlier. Businesses and
schools were closed.
   "Everything's blocked," David Metelus, a 22-year-old mechanic in Ennery,
said.
   Police regained control in three of the 11 towns affected. Reports from
the other eight were vague. In Gonaives, rebels continued patrolling the
streets but there was relative calm.
   Bands of drunken pro-Aristide youths threw rocks at passing cars at the
edge of northern Cap-Haitien, a former Aristide stronghold whose support
for the president has waned with deepening poverty. Others said they were
protecting the city's half-million residents.
   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.
   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.
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 the island nation'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.
   The United States, meanwhile, was "pushing very hard for an end to
violence," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday. He said
the U.S. government was urging Haitian 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.
   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, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican
Republic, 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. Former President Bill Clinton sent 20,000 U.S.
troops in 1994 to restore Aristide.
   Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday the U.S. military has
"no plans to do anything" in Haiti.
   Tension has mounted since Aristide's party won flawed legislative
elections in 2000 and international donors blocked millions of dollars in
aid. Poverty 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 has pledged to improve the condition of the
poor.