20915: Esser: No Caricom handshake for Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com

Trinidad & Tobago Express
http://www.trinidadexpress.com

March 28th 2004

No Caricom handshake for Haiti
By Rickey Singh

A last-minute bid by Haiti's interim Prime Minister, Gerard Latortue,
to secure recognition by the Caribbean Community (Caricom) has
failed. His letter of "clarification" has been judged to be vague and
insufficient.

The region's governments will now press ahead with their March 3
decision in Jamaica for a United Nations-sponsored independent probe
into the controversial circumstances surrounding how President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide was removed from office on February 29.

While an official Caricom handshake with the regime in Port-au-Prince
is being delayed, the Community will keep the door open to Haiti's
return.

However, the leaders have made clear that official recognition of a
government in Port-au-Prince will be on the basis of Haiti's "return
to constitutional and representative democracy".

That was the verdict the Caricom leaders were finally ready to
declare shortly before one o'clock yesterday morning after intensive
deliberations that occupied some 12 hours of their two-day 15th
Inter-Sessional Meeting, which concluded at the Eastern Caribbean
Central Bank in St Kitts.

The firm stand by Caricom on post-Aristide Haiti came against intense
pressures from the United States of America to influence recognition
of the interim regime in Port-au-Prince.

So intense was behind-the-scenes lobbying from Washington, the Sunday
Express was reliably informed that while one Prime Minister felt
obliged to refuse to take a telephone call from a Bush administration
official, another was aggravated enough to respond with expletives
when presented with what was viewed as a virtual ultimatum.

Possible cuts in aid and trade benefits also surfaced, as well as a
threat by Washington to hold some governments responsible should any
American military personnel be killed on duty in the current unstable
political situation in Haiti.

Jamaica Prime Minister PJ Patterson in particular was identified for
special praise in the official end-of-conference communique for
guidance and positions adopted on the Haitian political crisis, and
for hosting President Aristide and his family.

Recognising that Patterson was at the time chairman when the "Caricom
Initiative" on the Haitian political crisis was exercised and with
Aristide still in power, the official recognition statement was
released to the media yesterday morning.

The Community's Secretary General, Edwin Carrington, told the Sunday
Express that Patterson "deserves a medal for the time, energy and
solid contributions" devoted to finding a practical resolution to the
Haitian political crisis prior to the sudden departure from office of
President Aristide.

Caricom's Core Group of Prime Ministers, established under
Patterson's leadership, has been reconstituted to remain engaged on
Haiti with the newly-elected Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda
Baldwin Spencer assuming the chairmanship.

The other heads of government comprising the Core Group are the Prime
Ministers of Trinidad and Tobago (Patrick Manning), The Bahamas
(Perry Christie), St Lucia (Kenny Anthony) and Jamaica's Patterson.

-Basseterre
.