19682: Esser: Haiti rebels threaten more strife (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com

CNN.com
Wednesday, March 3, 2004

Haiti rebels threaten more strife

Boucher says U.S. won't recognize Philippe

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (CNN) --Supporters of Haitian rebel leader Guy
Philippe burned paintings from the country's former army headquarters
Tuesday as Philippe declared himself the country's new police chief
and threatened to arrest Prime Minister Yvon Neptune.

"We have the base of the police with us," he said. "Almost 90 percent
of the police are with us now, working together and trying to take
the right decisions."

Philippe also demanded the surrender of 20 men he said were leaders
of armed gangs loyal to Haiti's exiled president, Jean-Bertrand
Aristide, and he called for the country's interim president to
re-establish Haiti's army.

Aristide disbanded the army, which overthrew him in 1991, after he
was returned to office in 1994.

There was no immediate comment from the government of interim
President Boniface Alexandre.

In Washington, Vice President Dick Cheney said he is happy that
Aristide is out of office -- but he denied Aristide's accusation that
the United States forced him from power.

Meanwhile, a U.S. State Department spokesman said the United States
would not recognize Philippe as head of Haiti's national police.

And Haiti's longtime dictator, Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier, told
a Miami television station that he wants to return to his homeland
but denied he is interested in seeking the country's presidency.

After his supporters entered Port-au-Prince on Monday, Philippe set
up shop in what was once the headquarters of Haiti's armed forces.

Under Aristide, the building was Haiti's ministry for women's affairs.

Philippe's supporters pulled paintings out of the building, located
across from the presidential palace in Port-au-Prince, and tossed
them on a bonfire Tuesday afternoon.

U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Washington did
not recognize Philippe's claim to authority and called on the rebels
to lay down their arms.

"There is an orderly and constitutional political process under way
in Haiti," Boucher said.

"That process needs to be respected by all Haitians, but we're glad
to see the violence in decreasing. But the rebels have no role to
play in this process and they need to lay down their arms and go
home."

Boucher said there was a distinction between the democratic
opposition groups seeking a role in a new Haitian government and
"groups that perpetrated violence so widely and broadly against the
Haitian people in recent weeks."

"We all know that these various individuals involved in this armed
violence, many of them have a very unsavory history, to say the
least," Boucher said. "We do not believe that those people are
welcome in the political process."

But Philippe said he would not take orders from other countries.

"This time, we won't take this pressure," he said. "If they want to
kill me, they can come and kill me. I'm ready to die for my country."

Philippe called on the interim president to re-establish the Haitian
army, though he acknowledged that restoring the military would take
time, and he called on the international community to assist in its
reconstitution.

Haiti's armed forces overthrew Aristide, the country's first
democratically elected president, in 1991, and the United States
restored him to office in 1994.

Early Sunday, faced with a rebellion that was spreading rapidly
toward Port-au-Prince, Aristide resigned and left Haiti aboard a U.S.
jet. But after landing in the Central African Republic, Aristide told
CNN that he was forced into exile by the United States.

Aristide says he was forced out of Haiti in a "real coup d'etat" led
by the United States, in what he called a "modern way to have a
modern kidnapping."

"I was told that to avoid bloodshed I'd better leave," he said in an
interview on CNN Monday.

The leader of the Central African Republic called his decision to
grant asylum to Aristide, "a humanitarian act" but in a statement
released Tuesday also expressed solidarity with Haitians who are
trying to rebuild their government.

General Francois Bozize said his nation "welcomes a person in
difficulty and in need to find a true hospitality."

In an interview Tuesday with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Cheney said that
accusation is "simply not true." But he added, "I'm happy he's gone."

"I think the Haitian people are better off for it," he said. "I think
they now have an opportunity to elect a new government, and that's as
it should be."

Duvalier request

U.S., French and Canadian troops have been dispatched to Haiti to
restore order after Aristide's ouster, and a U.S. Marine contingent
moved to secure the capital's seaport Tuesday.

The United States has warned the interim government that "violence
will not be tolerated," the State Department official said.

"So far it is working," the official said, adding, "We have made
clear to the rebels they need to be part of the solution, not part of
the problem."

Meanwhile, Duvalier -- whose family ruled Haiti from 1957 to 1986 --
told Miami television station WFOR that he wants to return to his
homeland as soon as possible.

Duvalier has lived in exile in France since his overthrow in 1986. He
said he requested a diplomatic passport several weeks ago, while
Aristide was still in power.

Asked if he plans to return to Haiti to run for president, Duvalier
said, "That is not on my agenda.''

-- CNN Correspondent Lucia Newman and producers Ingrid Arnesen and
Elise Labott contributed to this report.

Find this article at:
http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americas/03/02/haiti.rebels