18857: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Uprising (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By MICHAEL NORTON

   PORT-AU-PRINCE, Feb 19 (AP) -- President Jean-Bertrand Aristide declared
Thursday he is ready to die to defend his country against a bloody
rebellion, indicating he plans to cling to power. The U.S. government,
citing continued violence, urged Americans to leave Haiti.
   Aristide's defiance and Washington's warning came as the United States
and other countries were preparing a political plan to resolve the crisis.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said the plan could be presented to Haitian
government and opposition leaders as early as Thursday.
   The last major government bastion in northern Haiti was Cap-Haitien,
where armed supporters of Aristide patrolled the city Thursday, vowing to
fight any rebel attempt to seize control. Frightened police remained
barricaded in their station, saying they were too few and poorly armed to
repel any attack. Both sides have committed reprisal killings, and dozens
of homes have been torched.
   "I am ready to give my life if that is what it takes to defend my
country," Aristide told stony-faced police officers honoring slain comrades
at a ceremony in Port-au-Prince, the capital in the south.
   "If wars are expensive, peace can be even more expensive," warned
Aristide, who has survived three assassination attempts and a coup.
   Amid the chaos, the United States urged Americans to leaves Haiti. More
than 20,000 Americans, at least a quarter of them missionaries, are
registered with the U.S. Embassy.
   Peace Corps personnel were being withdrawn, and other U.S. citizens
should leave while commercial transportation is still available, the State
Department said.
   "American citizens should be aware that the U.S. Embassy has prohibited
travel by its staff outside of Port-au-Prince," the warning said.
   It added that the embassy's ability to provide emergency services to
American citizens outside the capital city was limited and had "drastically
decreased in recent days due to numerous random roadblocks set up by armed
groups."
   The Pentagon said it was sending a small military team to assess the
security of the U.S. Embassy and its staff in the Caribbean country.
   In Washington, Powell said the emerging political plan does not
contemplate Aristide's stepping down before his term ends in February 2006,
as Haiti's political opposition and rebels are demanding. But he said the
United States would not object if, as part of a negotiation with opposition
leaders, Aristide agreed to leave ahead of schedule.
   "I think if they will both accept this plan and start executing on it,
we might find a way through this crisis politically," Powell told ABC
Radio's "Live in America."
   But the plan does not address how to end the northern rebellion, which
has killed dozens of people. Among the dead are about 40 police officers,
according to Jean-Gerard Dubreuil, Haiti's undersecretary for public
security.
   Powell said the international community must do what it can to help
Aristide in his capacity as Haiti's elected leader. But many countries,
including the United States, have accused Aristide of using police and
militant supporters to stifle opposition.
   The uprising, which began Feb. 5, is led by a gang that says it was
armed by Aristide to terrorize his opponents in Gonaives, a rebel-held city
and the country's fourth-largest, northwest of Port-au-Prince. Its members
turned on Haiti's leader after gang leader Amiot Metayer was killed in
September, saying he was silenced to stop him spreading damaging
information about Aristide. Aristide denies any connection to the gang.
   On Thursday, armed men attacked the police station at Ouanaminthe, on
Haiti's northeast border with the Dominican Republic, and torched the
building, Radio Vision 2000 reported. It did not say if there were
casualties.
   The rebels were joined this week by a sinister group of former soldiers
and a death squad leader from the Haitian army that ousted Aristide in
1991. Aristide disbanded the army after he was restored to power in by a
U.S. invasion in 1994.
   Aristide got to serve only two years of his first term of office,
shortchanged by U.S. insistence that he could not recoup three years lost
in exile and had to respect a constitutional term limit.
   Instead, he handpicked his successor, and was largely seen as the power
behind the scenes until his return in 2000 through presidential elections
marred by a low voter turnout and an opposition boycott.
   He has lost much support since flawed legislative elections that year
led international donors to freeze aid, preventing him from fulfilling an
election promise to improve life for Haiti's 8 million people.
   Even before the rebellion, half Haiti's people went hungry daily,
according to aid organizations that warn of a looming humanitarian crisis.
   The United Nations said Thursday it was sending a team by air to
northwest Port-de-Paix and Cap-Haitien to assess the situation.
   "Mounting insecurity is jeopardizing food security and domestic
harvests. ... Some cities are already reportedly confronting food shortages
and significant price increases of essential commodities," said a statement
from the U.N. Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.