20442: (Chamberlain) Haiti needs long term international help-Annan (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     NEW YORK, March 16 (Reuters) - The international community and
countries such as the United States should remain engaged in Haiti long
after United Nations peacekeepers leave, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said
in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.
     Annan described the Haitian situation as "even more daunting today
than 10 years ago" when, with a U.N. Security council blessing, a
multinational force entered the country and restored Jean-Bertrand
Aristide, the elected president, to power.
     The U.N. authorized its member states to intervene again this year
after Aristide left the country on Feb. 28 after Haiti's  "police force had
disintegrated" and the country collapsed into violence amid calls for
Aristide to step down.
     "Haiti clearly is unable to sort itself out, and the effect of leaving
it alone would be continued or worsening chaos," said Annan. He noted that
"omissions or failures in previous international efforts" played a part in
current problems.
     While the Security Council gave the U.N. just three months to work on
security problems in Haiti, Annan said Haiti will need international help
for rebuilding the country after U.N. peacekeepers or "blue helmets" leave.
     "We in the U.N. must work closely with our colleagues in Caricom
(Caribbean community) and the Organization of American States, adopting an
integrated and common approach." said Annan.
     Annan also suggested that these organizations should "remain engaged
in Haiti, as regional partners, long after the blue helmets have left."
     He also seemed to attribute responsibility to the United States by
pointing out that it is Haiti's neighbor and the "sole remaining
superpower."
     "Haiti must not again be isolated in its own neighborhood as it was in
the past," he said.
     As to the rebuilding of Haiti, Annan warned that "armed individuals
can only be kept out of trouble if, as well as being disarmed, they are
given real opportunities and jobs in the civilian economy."
     "Without economic growth, militias all too easily re-form, and the
cycle of poverty, violence and instability starts again," he said. Annan
suggested it could take a more than a decade to get legal services and
health care up and running.
     "A long-term effort -- 10 years or more -- is needed to help rebuild
the police and judiciary, as well as basic social services such as health
care and education," Annan said.
    The globalized world cannot afford countries such as Haiti, or
Afghanistan to be left in a political vacuum, he said.
     "The spectacle of human misery is harder to ignore than it used to be,
but the crucial difference from the past is that chaos can no longer be
contained by frontiers." he said.
     "It tends to spread, whether in the form of refugee flows, terrorism,
or illicit trafficking in drugs, weapons and even human beings."