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<font size=3>Hi. We're sending this despite the fact that the article is
couched in the NYT position that is anti Aristide and Lavelas, that is
couched in the US rhetoric of 'democracy' and supports the very forces
that are tied to the violence, the coup attempts, the Fraph violence and
US policy of trying to destroy a truly people's movement.<br>
It is important to read between the lines and important to read
Aristide's words.<br>
c<br><br>
<br>
Haiti's Embattled Leader Vows to Finish Term<br>
By LYDIA POLGREEN<br><br>
Published: February 17, 2004<br><br>
<br>
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Feb. 16 - President Jean-Bertrand Aristide,
defiant in<br>
the face of an increasingly violent opposition movement, denounced it
on<br>
Monday as an effort to overthrow Haiti's elected government and
declared<br>
that only he can save the country from civil war.<br><br>
<br>
"We have had 32 coups in our history," Mr. Aristide said in an
hourlong<br>
interview with The New York Times at the National Palace on Monday
morning.<br>
"The result is what we have now: moving from misery to poverty. We
need not<br>
continue moving from one coup d'état to another coup d'état, but from
one<br>
elected president to another elected president."<br><br>
Asked whether he would consider stepping aside to prevent further
bloodshed<br>
in a conflict that has killed dozens of people and paralyzed much of
the<br>
country, he replied: "I will leave office Feb. 7, 2006. My
responsibility is<br>
precisely to prevent that from happening. What we are doing now is<br>
preventing bloodshed."<br><br>
Speaking in an anteroom outside his spacious office, he called for
armed<br>
opposition groups to lay down their weapons and for political opponents
to<br>
begin discussions with the aim of having new parliamentary elections as
soon<br>
as possible.<br><br>
"It is time for us to stop the violence and to implement the
Caricom<br>
proposal for elections," Mr. Aristide said, referring to the plan of
the<br>
Caribbean Community, an organization of Caribbean states, to build
trust<br>
between the government and opposition groups as part of the groundwork
for<br>
new parliamentary elections.<br><br>
Political strife has swept the country since 2000, when a dispute
over<br>
parliamentary elections that the Organization of American States and
other<br>
foreign observers said were flawed led opposition political parties
to<br>
boycott the presidential election later that year.<br><br>
The confrontation has escalated in recent months as opposition groups
took<br>
to the streets to protest what they contend is Mr. Aristide's
increasingly<br>
autocratic style. This month, the political dispute turned violent,
with<br>
armed groups overrunning police stations in a dozen cities and
towns.<br><br>
The violence spread further on Monday. Militants took over the
police<br>
station in Hinche, a town about 45 miles northeast of Port-au-Prince,
the<br>
capital, killing the police chief, The Associated Press
reported.<br><br>
Now, with a violent group of former Aristide supporters in control
of<br>
Gonaïves, a major city on the main north-south highway between the
capital<br>
and Cap Haitien, the country's second largest city, a crisis looms in
the<br>
arid north, where more than a quarter million people need food assistance
to<br>
survive.<br><br>
The current political crisis is a dramatic reversal for Mr. Aristide,
once a<br>
parish priest serving in the slums who became the country's first<br>
democratically elected president. He was revered by millions,
especially<br>
among Haiti's rural and urban poor, and seen as the savior who would
finally<br>
lift the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. He turned in his
clerical<br>
collar for a wedding ring, marrying an American-born Haitian, and
his<br>
vestments for business suits.<br><br>
Opposition groups and diplomats accuse him of forming militant gangs
that<br>
act as a sort of auxiliary force to the police. One such group is behind
the<br>
uprising in Gonaïves. Its leaders say they have joined with sinister
figures<br>
from the country's violent past, including the leader of death squads
that<br>
terrorized the country after the coup in 1991 that ousted Mr. Aristide.
The<br>
United States returned him to power with 20,000 American troops in
1994.<br><br>
The 2000 elections led to the suspension of $500 million in
international<br>
aid, an act Mr. Aristide refers to as an "economic embargo,"
and he blames<br>
this suspension for his failure to transform Haiti's economy, health
and<br>
education. "I don't say I am the best," Mr. Aristide said.
"But think of<br>
what I did with nothing in terms of financial resources."<br><br>
He said his main achievement, however, was reviving Haiti's spirit. He
cited<br>
a march on Feb. 7, which the government claims drew a million people
in<br>
support of his presidency. "The Haitian people want to live with
dignity,"<br>
Mr. Aristide said. "We don't sell our dignity. Dignity is linked to
freedom.<br>
We don't sell our freedom.<br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
"If last Saturday, despite the economic situation, one million
marched in a<br>
peaceful way, it is because they see we are not lying to them, we
are<br>
telling them the truth. Dignity, freedom and truth are
linked."<br><br>
Political and civic opposition groups, who disavow any connection with
the<br>
armed uprisings, have said they will not take part in elections until
Mr.<br>
Aristide steps down.<br><br>
"It is impossible to get free, honest and democratic elections
with<br>
Jean-Bertrand Aristide in the National Palace because he will control
the<br>
whole process," said Micha Gaillard, a leader of the Democratic
Convergence,<br>
the main opposition group, in an interview on Monday. "But if the
first step<br>
for him is not to resign, then he should deliver what Caricom asked him
to<br>
do."<br><br>
The Caricom proposals would require Mr. Aristide to take a number of
steps,<br>
from ensuring that opposition marches can go forward to disarming groups
of<br>
militants loyal to the president. He must also reform the country's
tiny<br>
police force, which has fewer than 4,000 members, and form a
governing<br>
council that would include opposition groups. Mr. Aristide said he has
begun<br>
taking action on all of those requirements, but offered little
concrete<br>
evidence, only future plans.<br><br>
Mr. Aristide said opposition groups do not support elections because
they<br>
are afraid they will lose and would rather let the country slowly<br>
destabilize. "They fear the principle of `one man, one vote,' "
Mr. Aristide<br>
said. "They don't fear me; they fear the people. And they don't fear
the<br>
people because the people are violent. They fear the people because
the<br>
people are ready to vote."<br><br>
He accused the leaders of political and civic opposition groups of being
in<br>
league with the militants who have taken over Gonaïves. "The
government is<br>
doing what it can to have a safe environment," he said. "On the
other side,<br>
they are killing people, keeping 150,000 people hostage in
Gonaïves."<br><br>
Mr. Aristide condemned the involvement of Louis-Jodel Chamblain, an
official<br>
in the former Haitian Army who was accused of committing many atrocities
as<br>
part of the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti, known as
Fraph,<br>
after the 1991 coup.<br><br>
"Fraph and the army killed more than 5,000 people and pigs were
eating their<br>
corpses," he said. "And today Fraph is back."<br><br>
Experts on Haitian politics said the arrival of militants like Mr.
Chamblain<br>
had made it all the more urgent that the current crisis be resolved
quickly,<br>
before those forces take control of a larger portion of the
country.<br><br>
Henry Carey, a professor of political science at Georgia State
University,<br>
said the opposition must abandon its insistence that no elections be
held<br>
until Mr. Aristide is gone. "What they should do is put the
interests of<br>
country ahead of their own antipathy and own personal enmity,"
Professor<br>
Carey said.<br><br>
At the same time, Mr. Aristide must own up to relying on violent gangs
and<br>
take the necessary steps to disarm and neutralize them, Professor
Carey<br>
said. "What he has got to do is stop the violation of human rights
and he<br>
has got to demobilize these violent groups," he said. "But he
can't do that<br>
without international help."<br><br>
<br>
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