18845: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Aristide (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   PORT-AU-PRINCE, Feb 19 (AP) -- President Jean-Bertrand Aristide said
Thursday he was "ready to die" to defend his country, indicating he would
not surrender power as demanded by political opponents and rebels driving
the chaos in northern Haiti.
   Haiti's leader, speaking on the 14th day of a rebellion that has taken
some 60 lives, honored police officers killed in the uprising and urged a
constitutional resolution to Haiti's crisis.
   "I am ready to give my life if that is what it takes to defend my
country," he said. "If wars are expensive, peace can be even more
expensive."
   Aristide, who has survived three assassination attempts and a coup
d'etat, spoke after rebuffing a U.S. proposal that he defuse the situation
by calling early elections and allowing a temporary board to govern Haiti
until a president is chosen.
   He repeatedly has said that he will not leave office before his term
expires Feb. 7, 2006.
   "Our mandate we will protect by facing terrorism in a legal way," he
said.
   Aristide was chosen as Haiti's first freely elected leader in a
landslide election in 1990. Eight months later he was ousted by the army
and took refuge in the United States. He was restored to power by a U.S.
invasion in 1994 and disbanded the army.
   Aristide called for the international community to recognize that his is
a legitimate government that is fighting for democracy against a band of
terrorists.
   And he asked police officers to help Haitians preserve democracy.
   "I order the police to accompany the people courageously with the
constitution as their guide," he said. "When the police are united to the
people, they are invincible."
   Haiti's police force, which Aristide said numbers less than 4,000, is
demoralized in the face of rebels who outnumber and outgun them in outlying
posts where the primary target is police stations that are torched and
officers who are killed.
   It's not known how many officers have been killed in the revolt that
began Feb. 5.