20540: (Chamberlain) Haitian children most vulnerable victims of revolt (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, March 18 (Reuters) - The United Nations
children's fund UNICEF called on the Haitian authorities on Thursday to
protect children affected by weeks of violence and said at least 1.2
million young Haitians were at risk.
     UNICEF spokeswoman Francoise Gruloos-Ackermans said it was unclear how
many children had been injured, attacked, killed or forced to take up arms
in a monthlong revolt that drove President Jean-Bertrand Aristide from
power at the end of last month.
     "I think that every child has been in contact or has seen or been
involved in violence, and this is everywhere in the country,"
Gruloos-Ackermans told a news conference in Port-au-Prince.
     "We demand that the local authorities protect the rights of children,
and we demand the right to justice. We demand that those people who have
committed crimes against children be held responsible."
     UNICEF officials said 1.2 million children, in the total population of
8 million, were considered vulnerable to hunger, disease or violence.
     A third of the children under the age of 5 in the poorest country of
the Americas are malnourished. Particularly at risk are 200,000 children
orphaned through AIDS. Every year, 5,000 babies are born with the HIV virus
that causes the disease.
     Gruloos-Ackermans said UNICEF teams traveling around the country were
cheered at seeing schools slowly reopen. Many Haitian children survive only
because of free food handouts at school.
     But she said many students had yet to turn up because they fled with
their families into the mountains to escape fighting between armed rebels
and gangs that helped oust Aristide, and police or pro-Aristide militias.
     An uncertain number had been killed when militias or rebels torched
the homes of opponents. Others were severely traumatized after witnessing
reprisal killings or seeing bodies left to rot in the streets.
     The revolt, which began on Feb. 5 in the northwestern town of Gonaives
and spread through the north of the Caribbean country, killed more than 200
people, and possibly quite a lot more.
     A 2,700-strong international peace force, led by U.S. Marines, began
arriving hours after Aristide was pushed into exile and has begun restoring
order in the capital. The force on Wednesday began to move out to other
towns and cities.