Cedras Resigns in Haiti, Ending Brutal Regime : Caribbean: Military leader, chief of staff quit under U.S. pressure. Move clears way for return of Aristide.

Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras quit as army commander Monday, ending three years of brutal and corrupt military dictatorship that left Haiti in an economic coma and occupied by foreign troops.

Reacting to intense U.S. pressure, Cedras submitted his resignation just two days short of the formal end of his three-year term as Haiti’s military chief and five days before the expected return of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the man the army drove from office Sept. 30, 1991.

The act heartened the U.S. government, which has had an off-and-on relationship with Cedras over the years, praising him for his role in guaranteeing the 1989 election that brought Aristide to office and then condemning him for overthrowing the nation’s first democratically elected president.

“We welcome the resignation of Gen. Cedras,” said U.S. Embassy spokesman Stanley Shrager. “His anticipated departure represents the end of a sad chapter of Haitian history.

“The past three years,” Shrager said, “have brought unlimited suffering to the Haitian people, who have known more than their share of tragedy, witnessed more than their share of death and lost more than their share of hope.

“Those days are over, and the return of President Aristide on Oct. 15 opens a new page and a brighter future for the people of this nation.”

Accompanying the military commander in his loss of power was Brig. Gen. Philippe Biamby, the army chief of staff. Biamby, who had told friends he would die before quitting, submitted his resignation to Cedras on Saturday and disappeared from sight.

Cedras also indicated he would leave Haiti, although he left open when he would go and where.

“I am officially giving up the responsibility of the military institution,” he said in brief and almost inaudible departing remarks. “I have decided to leave our country.”

U.S. officials had pushed Cedras not only to surrender his title before the week’s end but to go into exile, even offering to fly him to one of several countries offering him repose.

Cedras was permitted a brief ceremony Monday morning to turn over his office to interim commander Maj. Gen. Jean-Claude Duperval.

But in what U.S. officials acknowledged was a clear effort at humiliating Cedras and displaying his dependence on U.S. troops, the ritual was held on a barricaded side street next to the military headquarters, with only a small honor guard, army band and about 50 American troops acting as guards inside the roped-off perimeter.

The sound system was so poor that even people standing 20 feet away couldn’t hear Cedras tell his forces that they will be judged by history as having done their jobs.

U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Hugh Shelton, commander of the 19,000 U.S. troops virtually occupying Haiti, sat off to the side, chewing gum and appearing to pay more attention to the crowd outside the barricades than to Cedras. Shelton stood only when Cedras turned over his flag to Duperval.

Duperval, a 47-year-old military academy classmate of both Cedras and Biamby, then spoke, and his remarks also were largely unheard by the crowd. But what he did say was significant, at least in terms of recognizing that the old days of arbitrary military behavior are over.

Speaking of the presence of the U.S. troops as “serene,” the portly Duperval, who is unlikely to become Aristide’s permanent army commander, said, “I hope for an army of the people, a united army that respects law, discipline, life and the personal rights of the people.”

What could be heard clearly during the ritual were curses and derisive chants from the 3,000 jeering Haitians gathered on the fringes--mostly obscenities directed at Cedras. They also shouted “Shelton! Shelton!” and waved American flags, some with Aristide’s portrait superimposed on the stars and stripes.

And stronger things than curses were flung at Cedras as he left the 25-minute ceremony--rocks broke his car window, resulting in at least two bursts of warning shots fired by the general’s bodyguard.

Both Cedras and Biamby, along with former police chief Lt. Col. Michel-Joseph Francois, were required to leave office no later than Saturday under an agreement reached last month with former President Jimmy Carter.

Francois, who most sources say organized the 1991 coup and dragged a reluctant and indecisive Cedras along at the last minute, left first, resigning last Tuesday and fleeing to the neighboring Dominican Republic.

Cedras formally submitted his resignation Sunday to Emile Jonassaint, the last of two puppet civilian presidents he installed during his rule.

Cedras wanted to stay until Wednesday and exit in a formal ceremony on the wide lawns of the Presidential Palace that would project honor and dignity. Shelton originally agreed to that, U.S. military sources said, as a gesture to a fellow officer and in appreciation for the cooperation pledged by Cedras when the American forces arrived three weeks ago.

But when Cedras and Biamby began delaying and obstructing and even harassing the U.S. mission, Shelton decided a dose of humility would fit Cedras better than a ceremonial sword and white-gloved salutes, U.S. sources said.

“By making him leave only hours before he was to march out claiming ‘mission accomplished,’ ” said a U.S. Army officer, “Shelton destroyed any residual attraction Cedras might have had with his own troops, and it allows Aristide to come back with no distractions.”

Although Cedras had denied publicly that he would either resign early or leave Haiti, family friends and diplomatic sources said he has opted for exile, ultimately in Spain, where he once attended a training course and now owns two homes.

The friends said Cedras decided to leave partly because of American insistence but also because he and his wife, Yannick, could not face a constant reminder from Aristide’s presence that the general had destroyed his career for nothing.

Wherever he ends up, Cedras can live comfortably on the millions of dollars that Haitian experts say he accumulated during his stay in power.

But money doesn’t buy safety, at least not in Haiti. The United States pledged to protect Cedras in the short run but indicated that if he stayed, he would be on his own.

Biamby’s vow to stay in Haiti was taken more seriously. A 42-year-old bachelor who has lived primarily in his childhood room in his mother’s house, Biamby has always pursued an intense privacy that has left him without much foreign experience or many friends.

Still, Haitian sources said Biamby probably would also go.

Cedras, Biamby and Francois were the target of American policy and U.N. resolutions, which demanded their removal and Aristide’s restoration as the price of ending financial and trade sanctions that left the perpetually impoverished nation in economic death throes.

With the end of military power and Aristide’s return, the sanctions will be formally removed by Sunday and a massive reconstruction program begun, U.N. officials said.

President Clinton, praising the U.S. military’s performance in Haiti, said Aristide will go back to Haiti this weekend as planned. “I am pleased to announce that President Aristide will return home to resume his rightful place this Saturday, Oct. 15,” Clinton said in a televised speech to the nation Monday.

“In just three weeks, the level of violence is down, the Parliament is back, refugees are returning from Guantanamo (the U.S. base in Cuba) and now the military leaders are leaving,” Clinton said.

“But I also want to caution again, the job in Haiti remains difficult and dangerous,” Clinton said. “We still have a lot of work ahead of us. But our troops are keeping America’s commitment to restore democracy.”

Burt Wides, one of Aristide’s American lawyers, said the outstanding issue on Aristide’s mind is the future shape of the high command of the Haitian military.

Wides said Monday that U.S. officials in Haiti were pressuring Aristide’s people there to permit some of the high-ranking officers directly under the coup leaders to remain in power, at least for the interim, and help cleanse the military of human rights abusers.

Aristide is pushing for the conditions agreed to in the Governors Island accord of July, 1993: that all members of the high command would retire or take assignments abroad.

Times staff writer Elizabeth Shogren in Washington contributed to this report.