Haiti asks world for help to end uprising

By Maggie Farley
Los Angeles Times

	JOE RAEDLE / GETTY IMAGES Louis Jodel Chamblain, center, is surrounded by supporters yesterday in Maissade, Haiti. Chamblain, a former death-squad chief, leads gunmen who took over the town of Hinche, killing its police chief.
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Secretary of State Colin Powell responded that the United States, which sent in soldiers to restore President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power in 1994 after he was ousted in a coup that led to an influx of Haitian boat people to Florida, had "no enthusiasm" for sending military forces to Haiti.

He said the administration was working toward a political solution.

More than 50 people have been killed in Haiti since anti-Aristide forces rose up Feb. 5 in the city of Gonaives, seizing a police station. Violent clashes have spread to other areas. Yesterday, rebels reportedly had taken full control of the central city of Hinche, a day after they attacked the police station and killed the police chief.

Prime Minister Yvon Neptune said his government was in danger of being toppled, and asked the international community "to show that it really wants peace and stability in Haiti."

"We are witnessing the coup d'état machine in motion," he said in Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital.

Aristide, a former priest who was wildly popular when he became Haiti's first freely elected leader in 1990, has lost support since his party swept legislative elections in 2000, in a vote boycotted by the opposition, which feared a repeat of violence that marred a parliamentary election earlier that year.

He is accused of using police and armed militants to stifle dissent and allowing corruption to fund lavish lifestyles for his cronies as the majority of the 8 million people suffer deeper misery.

But other countries say they cannot condone the use of force by Aristide's opponents to remove him.

"Certainly there needs to be some changes in the way Haiti is governed and the security situation as well," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. But he added, "That's a matter for the people of Haiti to decide."

In Paris, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin summoned ministers to discuss ways to help stabilize the former French colony, where about 2,000 French citizens still live.
 
The French Defense Ministry said it has 4,000 military personnel at two bases in the area, in Martinique and Guadeloupe.

But de Villepin noted that outside military intervention would be "very difficult."

"President Aristide let his country drift away year after year," de Villepin said. "It is now time that he finds the strength to move toward dialogue."

Canada, a key U.S. ally in the crisis, said it would be "madness" to send reinforcements now, but offered nearly $1 million in medical and food aid. The United States said it was ready to give $500,000 in humanitarian assistance through the United Nations.

A spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, Joung-ah Ghedini, said the situation in Haiti "could go from precarious to a full-blown emergency" on short notice.

U.S. officials said they saw no sign at this point of a repeat of the refugee crisis of the early 1990s, when the country was under military rule.

Nevertheless, they said there are contingency plans at the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for a Haitian exodus.

An exodus of Haitians to Florida almost certainly would have an impact on the November presidential election. At a hearing last week, Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., made clear his concern about the need to head off another refugee crisis.

The revolt was launched Feb. 5 by a ragtag cadre of former Aristide supporters who enlisted a former army death squad leader, an escaped convict and a police chief accused of fomenting a coup two years ago.

They now control roads leading to the Artibonite district, Haiti's breadbasket and home to 1 million people, and have cut supplies of food and fuel to northern Haiti.

Witnesses said 50 rebels led by former death squad leader Louis-Jodel Chamblain descended on Hinche on Monday, freeing prisoners, torching the police station and killing the police chief and two officers. The attackers also burned down police stations in nearby towns of Pandiassou and Maissade, they said.

Yesterday, residents staged a demonstration in favor of the rebels, who set up camp outside the town but returned throughout the day, Radio Metropole reported.

American missionary Terry Snow said he was threatened yesterday by 10 Aristide partisans, from the "Clean Sweep" gang that he has seen taking direct orders from Aristide.

On Monday they told him they him they were going to "kill some bad people." Yesterday, he was told, "If you don't shut up, we'll kill you."

Snow, 39, from Granbury, Texas, told The Associated Press that he has asked the 20 missionaries to leave St. Marc but that he is staying, though "we are fearful of the night."

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