24832: (news) Chamberlain: South Africa-Aristide

[sak-pase@bimini.ws]

Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

  By TERRY LEONARD

  PRETORIA, South Africa, April 19 (AP) -- Former Haitian president
Jean-Bertrand Aristide charged Tuesday that political violence in Haiti was
a "black holocaust" orchestrated by France and the United States.
  Speaking to reporters in Pretoria where he lives in exile, Aristide
renewed his charge that he was kidnapped by the United States and France as
part of a coup d'etat in February 2004 and that he remains Haiti's
democratically elected leader.
  Aristide refused to say if he would be a candidate in general elections
promised later this year in Haiti, but he said there could be no free
democratic elections in the troubled country until thousands of his Lavalas
party members are freed from jail or allowed to return from exile. The
ousted president said he wanted to return to Haiti, "whenever conditions
permit."
  Aristide also again denied fomenting political violence in Haiti from
South Africa and defended his former interior minister, Jocelerme Privert,
who was charged Monday in connection with the killing of political
opponents. He called the charges "lies."
  "We are for peace, not violence," said Aristide, claiming his Lavalas
party members were victims, not perpetrators.
  "Racism is behind a black holocaust in Haiti," said Aristide. "More than
10,000 of my supporters have been killed in the past year."
  Pierre Esperance, the director of National Coalition of Haitian Rights,
said last month the figure for the total number of people killed in
political violence during the last year -- not just Lavalas supporters --
is between 1,000 and 1,500. Police also have given much lower estimates.
  He also charged that killings were being orchestrated by the United
States and France, who he has said kidnapped him and organized the coup
that ousted him.
  Former soldiers and gangsters led a three-week rebellion that ousted
Aristide on Feb. 29, 2004. The United States and France, Haiti's former
colonial ruler, said they had suggested he step down for the good of Haiti.
Both have denied kidnapping Aristide or staging a coup.
  U.N. peacekeepers have moved aggressively in recent weeks against pro-
and anti-Aristide street gangs as well as the former soldiers who helped
oust Aristide, saying their refusal to disarm has undermined efforts to
pacify Haiti. U.S. Ambassador James Foley said earlier this month that the
United States was concerned that both street gangs and the ex-soldiers were
trying to destabilize the interim government.
  Aristide became Haiti's first democratically elected president in
December 1990. He was overthrown by a coup in 1991; restored to power by
U.S. troops in 1994; and elected president again in 2000.