18445: Esser: Rebels in Gonaives partially contraband traffickers (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com

Radio Netherlands Wereldomroep
Wednesday, 11 February, 2004

Haiti on the brink
by Tim Fisher, 11 February 2004


Haiti´s embattled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide

Haiti appears to be on the brink of a major humanitarian crisis as
armed groups opposed to President Jean-Bertrand Aristide battle
police for control of several towns and cities in the north of the
country. The UN's World Food Programme says deliveries of aid
supplies are proving difficult because of the security situation.

The latest wave of violence in the Caribbean nation, which began last
Thursday, has claimed at least 42 lives and is being described by
some as the strongest challenge thus far to the once enormously
popular president.

President under fire

Opposition to Mr Aristide - a former priest who was elected for his
first term in 1990 - has been growing since controversial elections
in 2000, which returned him to power for a second time, and the start
of his ruling by decree last year. Once regarded as a champion of the
people, and welcomed back enthusiastically when returned to power by
the United States after he was deposed by a military coup in 1991,
the president has recently been labelled by some as a "dictator and a
despot" and accused of violating human rights.

However, while Mr Aristide has accused the opposition of pushing for
a coup to force him from office, the "rebel" groups now operating in
the north of Haiti appear not to be linked to his political opponents.

According to Christian Girault, an expert on Haitian affairs at the
French National Centre for Scientific Research, at least some of the
people now in control of the city of Gonaïves are contraband
"traffickers [who] don't see any benefit in siding with Aristide any
more."

Indeed, opponents of the president in the capital, Port au Prince,
admit they want to see Mr Aristide go, but say they are not connected
with the armed groups involved in the current fighting.

Relying on the people

Haiti has been without an army since 1995, which leaves the police
force of some 5,000 officers with the task of trying to maintain the
status quo in a nation of close to 8.5 million people. Prime Minister
Yvon Neptune has admitted the police cannot restore order alone, but
says the government is also relying on the people to back the
president. Pro-Aristide militia groups have already struck back
against the rebels, particularly in Haiti's second city, Cap-Haitien,
but foreign involvement might be the solution if things escalate,
says Christian Girault:

"Probably the international community would have to impose mediation
[Š] and the most important influence in that case would be the United
States."

The United States has a history of intervening in Haitian affairs,
having invaded the country without a fight in 1994 and subsequently
steering it back to civilian rule under President Aristide. But it
has no immediate plans to intervene this time, and has been calling
for a political solution to be brokered with the help of a body such
as the Organisation of American States.

Power vacuum

Christian Girault doubts whether President Aristide will serve out
his full term, due to end in roughly two years time, but is concerned
that the Haitian opposition offers no clear alternative to the
country's current leadership:

"The political opposition is very divided, and there also a big risk
of some strong men coming and wanting power just for the power, with
no programme at all. It's disturbing."

Others, too, fear the possible scenario of the incumbent president
being ousted without there being a credible political force to take
over the reins.