23870: Slavin: (News) Haitians caught in gangs' crossfire chicagotribune.com (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JPS390@aol.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0412090154dec09,0,6748961.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

Haitians caught in gangs' crossfire


In capital's slum, young men wage war against the government and each other, often killing innocent residents

By Gary Marx
Tribune foreign cordrespondent

December 9, 2004

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti --  Kele Tintin was walking to work on Route 9 when she was hit by a bullet in the chest.

Tintin held on long enough to give birth to a boy. She died before the next sunrise, another victim of an escalating gang war that in recent months has claimed dozens of lives.

"There are two possibilities when you walk that road," said Dumas Jean, 30, Tintin's husband. "You could make it through or you could die. I couldn't tell her not to go. She had to go to work. Both of us need to work to survive."

Jean lives in Cite Soleil, a sprawling slum with more than 200,000 residents on the northern edge of Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital.

The area has long been a hotbed of support for Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the charismatic priest elected Haiti's president in 1990. After being ousted in a coup in 1991 and brought back in 1994 on the heels of a U.S. invasion, Aristide armed thousands of young supporters in Cite Soleil and other slums.

The young men formed street gangs that today are waging war against the government of interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue, who was installed in February after Aristide resigned in the face of U.S. pressure and a growing insurgency.

But the gangs in Cite Soleil also are waging war against each other. On one side of Route 9 are forces led by Emmanuel "Dread" Wilme, who remains allied to Aristide's Lavalas Family party. On the other side, in an area known as Boston, are the anti-Aristide forces of a gang leader known as Labaniere.

Divided like Beirut in '80s

The battle, though, often appears to have less to do with politics than simple gang warfare over turf, drug sales, extortion and other illegal activities.

Today, Cite Soleil is divided in half much like Beirut during the Lebanon civil war in the 1980s or Belfast in the worst days of sectarian violence.

The roads are cut between the two sides, stifling commerce and dividing friends and families. Many residents in Wilme's turf are forced to take rickety sailboats across the bay to get to work in Port-au-Prince.

Residents do not dare cross by foot from one side to another lest they be tagged as informants and killed.

Sniper fire claims victims on both sides of a no-man's land of empty streets and abandoned buildings that not long ago was a bustling outdoor market.

"The only child that I had was killed by Labaniere's gang," said Gezuela Pierre, 20, as she stood about 50 yards from the dividing line on Wilme's turf. "He was 5 years old. I was walking him to school and the shooting started."

In Boston, Charle Chelot, 20, said his brother was shot to death three weeks ago by Wilme gang members as he went to buy a T-shirt. Robens Thevenen, 19, displayed a scabby bullet hole through his right ear and another in his arm.

Thevenen said gang members crossed the dividing line and opened fire into a crowd on a recent Saturday. "The bullet that went though my arm hit an old lady in the head and killed her," he said.

Facing such violence, outgunned Haitian police no longer enter Cite Soleil. Aid groups have pulled out. Schools and churches are closed, as is Cite Soleil's only hospital.

The hospital was shut three months ago after a top French diplomat visiting the facility was pinned down for two hours in a gun battle between his bodyguards and gangs allied with Wilme.

The diplomat was rescued by Brazilian marines who patrol Cite Soleil as part of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Haiti.

"The gangs are crazy. We don't understand what they are fighting for," said Capt. Henrique Amaral, a 30-year-old Brazilian marine and intelligence officer who operates in Cite Soleil.

Outsiders need permission

The only way for an outsider to visit Cite Soleil is to contact a top gang leader by cell phone and receive permission. A 2-foot wide ditch has been dug across the only road into Wilme's territory, blocking all vehicles.

Gang members stand guard at the entrance to the territory, pistols tucked into their waistbands or pockets.

When Wilme gives the order, a plank is shoved across the ditch allowing the visitor's car to enter. Several blocks ahead, Wilme is leaning against a wall, the scars of past bullet wounds marking both arms.

"A lot of people are dying," said Wilme, his front teeth framed with gold fillings. "I have to give funerals for everyone. I'm getting very poor."

As Wilme spoke, two dozen mourners lugging Tintin's coffin passed by on the way to the cemetery. The mourners swayed back and forth as they chanted religious songs.

A short time later, Jean--Tintin's husband--explained that he had nowhere to take his wife for medical treatment after she was shot because the hospital was closed. She died on a mattress in their one-room hovel.

An impoverished mason with a 3-year-old son, Jean said he did not have the money to care for the newborn. He and other family members pleaded for help.

"As his aunt, I ask if you can take this little baby away and give him a better life," said Rosianne Moliere, the newborn resting on her lap.

Copyright © 2004, Chicago Tribune
------------
J.P. Slavin
New York
------------