Huge Protest to Test Resolve of Aristide

Violent clashes spread to the historic city of Cap Haitien on Tuesday as government forces and their opponents prepared to square off for a showdown Thursday that diplomats say will test President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s willingness to restore calm even at the price of his own power.

Haiti’s mainstream political opposition has called on supporters to stage a massive but peaceful demonstration against Aristide’s government. The protest could add to the unrest gripping about a dozen towns in this Caribbean island nation.

About 50 people have died in the last week, according to local media and the Red Cross. International relief agencies and watchdog groups have urged the government and opposition groups to take steps to ease the conflict.

Aristide foes say they are protesting the president’s corruption and the repression of political opponents. They want him to relinquish his office and make way for a new government.

As the country braced for more unrest, the U.S. State Department on Tuesday authorized the departure of family members and nonemergency employees of the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince.

The travel warning also urged private American citizens to leave Haiti if they could do so safely.

“Americans are reminded of the potential for spontaneous demonstrations and violent confrontations between government supporters and students and other groups that oppose the government of Haiti,” the warning said.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the Bush administration recognized that “reaching a political settlement will require some fairly thorough changes in the way Haiti is governed.”

Referring to a proposal to end the crisis by the Caribbean Community, the 15-nation regional bloc known as Caricom, Boucher said, “I think that could indeed involve changes in Aristide’s position.”

The Haitian leader is likely to face growing demands for his resignation if he allows opponents to demonstrate freely. Critics fear he could crack down brutally on Thursday’s protests if he believes that they could generate momentum for his political opponents.

Aristide’s allies, including Prime Minister Yvon Neptune, have described the deadly clashes as a plot to force a coup.

On Tuesday, three Cabinet members described those seeking Aristide’s ouster as “terrorists” bent on destroying the country, making no distinction between mainstream political opposition in the capital and the armed gangs battling police in a dozen cities.

Armed thugs struck back at opposition supporters in Cap Haitien, Haiti’s second-largest city, setting fire to a restaurant owned by an Aristide critic and throwing up flaming barricades to prevent rebels in nearby Dondon from spreading their revolt to the northern port city, Radio Vision 2000 reported.

The attacks on rebels involved in the uprising and figures associated with Aristide’s political opposition have caused concern among diplomats about how Aristide’s police force will react to Thursday’s events, expected to be the first protests in the capital since last Thursday, when the countryside was swept up in gruesome attacks and reprisals.

“What happens here on the ground in the next days or weeks will have a big role to play in determining the prospects for a political solution and its shape,” a senior U.S. official here said.

Caricom has asked Aristide to provide assurances that he would bring rivals back into the electoral arena.

Opposition parties refused to field candidates in the presidential election of November 2000, leaving Aristide virtually unchallenged. Parliamentary elections six months earlier were marred by attacks on opposition groups by government supporters.

Pro-Aristide gangs continued to attack opposition rallies, prompting the opposition to boycott preparations for elections that should have taken place last year.

With the expiration of most deputies’ mandates in January, the Haitian parliament has ceased to function and Aristide rules by decree.

On Tuesday, the United Nations World Food Program in Geneva warned that road barricades were hampering the delivery of aid to 270,000 people in the famine-ravaged regions south of Cap Haitien.

It was in the territory around Cap Haitien that slaves rebelled against French colonial rule in 1791, leading to the creation of the first black nation.

At a news conference in Port-au-Prince, three officials in Aristide’s government portrayed the crisis as an opposition plot to destabilize the country.

“The entire population must work together with the police to fight this phenomenon of terrorism,” said national security chief Jean-Gerard Debreuil.

He and Interior Minister Joceleme Privet suggested that many members of the National Police, which has been Haiti’s only armed force since Aristide disbanded the army in 1995, have refused to defend their positions against the rebel onslaught out of concern for the lives of bystanders.