19275: Globe and Mail:Aristide's gangs gird for battle fwd (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: thor burnham <thorald_mb@hotmail.com>

forwarded by Thor Burnham

Aristide's gangs gird for battle

By PAUL KNOX
With reports from Jonathan Fowlie in Toronto, and Jeff Sallot and Drew Fagan
in Ottawa
Thursday, February 26, 2004 - Page A1

PORT-AU-PRINCE -- Armed supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide
tightened their control over Haiti's capital yesterday, bracing for a rebel
onslaught as foreign governments pondered a stabilization force for the
strife-torn country.

Gangs of loyalists fired guns into the air, robbed motorists at barricades
and patrolled the streets in pickup trucks, threatening the few drivers
brave enough to venture into near-empty streets.

Canada closed its embassy indefinitely. Ambassador Kenneth Cook said the
building that houses it was surrounded early in the day by "burning tires
and people shooting guns," although the mission did not appear to be a
specific target.

About 200 travellers, many of them Canadians, had to delay plans to leave
Haiti when Montreal-based Air Transat cancelled a charter flight.

A Canadian official said 45 people who turned up at the Port-au-Prince
airport were offered other flights out of the country.

As the tension mounted, Haiti's Caribbean neighbours stepped up pressure on
Canada and other countries to agree to send troops or police to head off an
exodus of refugees.

An estimated 300 insurgents, led by former police and army officers linked
to putsch attempts and paramilitary death squads, have driven police from
most of northern Haiti.

Mr. Aristide warned Tuesday that the rebellion could lead thousands of
refugees to set sail for Florida in a replay of the "boat people" crisis of
1994. There are also fears of a bloodbath if pro- and anti-Aristide groups
battle for control of Port-au-Prince.

The rebels say they could attack the capital in the next few days.

But there was strong resistance in Ottawa, Washington and Paris to sending
in forces without a power-sharing deal between Mr. Aristide and opposition
leaders in Port-au-Prince, who say they have no connection to the rebels.

"We have plans in place to be able to act, but we need the correct political
conditions," Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham told reporters in Ottawa.

The opposition continued to insist on Mr. Aristide's resignation yesterday,
making such a deal impossible, and Mr. Graham did hint that Canada's
attitude could change. "If conditions deteriorate significantly further, we
may be obliged to take different steps," he said.

Apparently in an attempt to break the diplomatic logjam, France issued a
thinly veiled call for Mr. Aristide to step down.

"It is up to him to draw the conclusions within the rule of law," Foreign
Minister Dominique de Villepin said in a statement. "It is his decision, his
responsibility." He said a peace force should be established immediately for
deployment once a political agreement is reached.

The statement marked the first time a foreign government appeared to align
itself with the demand for Mr. Aristide's resignation.

In New York, the United Nations Security Council issued a statement
deploring the opposition's rejection of power-sharing with Mr. Aristide.

The gangs that fanned out through Port-au-Prince yesterday appeared to be
responding to a government call for a mobilization to defend the capital.

An invasion from the north along exposed roads would be risky for the
insurgents, who are thought to number several hundred. But Port-au-Prince is
rife with suspicion, some of it informed, that they have supporters in
place, awaiting a call to battle.

Pro-Aristide militants have vowed to defend the capital to the death.
Yesterday, they forced motorists to stop at barricades made of rusted stoves
and refrigerators, twisted car bodies, concrete blocks and boulders.

At one major crossroads, a Globe and Mail vehicle was stopped by a group of
toughs demanding money. A young man dressed in camouflage approached and
shouted at them to stop, allowing the vehicle to proceed.

Across the intersection, about 20 people surrounded a four-wheel-drive
vehicle, shouting and pounding on the hood, sides and roof. Few police were
in evidence.

Mr. Cook said the gunfire near the Canadian embassy appeared to be part of
the general pattern of violence, rather than an anti-Canadian attack. The
six Canadian diplomats remaining in Haiti will operate out of the
ambassador's residence, a walled compound in the suburb of Peguyville.

A nine-member Canadian Forces unit believed to include members of the highly
secretive Joint Task Force 2 was scheduled to arrive in Port-au-Prince
aboard a Hercules cargo plane to bolster security at the residence and make
plans for transporting Canadians out of Haiti if chaos spreads. Mr. Cook
said there are an estimated 1,500 Canadians in the country, including about
one thousand of Haitian origin.

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