24541: (news) Chamberlain: UN-Haiti (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By NICK WADHAMS

   UNITED NATIONS, March 22 (AP) -- Haitian gangs should accept a U.N.
offer to disarm and return to civilian life or else peacekeepers will deal
with them "with firmness," the head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the
nation said Tuesday.
   Juan Gabriel Valdes said the mission, known as MINUSTAH, was stepping up
action to ensure that militias and gangs do not disrupt elections set for
later this year. On Sunday, two U.N. soldiers were killed in Haiti, one of
them as peacekeepers raided a police station occupied by former soldiers.
   Valdes said the U.N. mission was offering armed gangs in shantytowns the
chance to turn over their weapons and return to civilian life. He said the
mission already was working toward that goal with armed groups, some of
them former Haitian military.
   "If these offers are not received, if it is not possible to continue to
follow a peaceful rendering of these weapons and the disarmament of these
groups, we will follow the same line of firmness that we have followed in
the last week vis-a-vis the former military," Valdes said.
   The United Nations was not imposing a deadline on the armed groups, he
said.