HAITI Nations shun President Aristide's pleas for help

The rebel leader said his forces were converging on the capital.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) -- Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide appealed for foreign peacekeepers even as key nations rebuffed him and the leader of rebels who have overrun half the country said his forces were closing in on the capital.
Hundreds of Aristide supporters, some armed with machetes and pistols, gathered Thursday outside the National Palace to protect the president. Teenagers driving bulldozers and forklifts built barricades of wrecked cars, telephone poles, chairs, garbage and burning tires.
In Washington, Secretary of State Colin Powell came close to telling Aristide he should bow out before his term expires in February 2006.
"Whether or not he is able to effectively continue as president is something he will have to examine carefully in the interests of the Haitian people," Powell said.
Also Thursday, police abandoned Haiti's third-largest city, Les Cayes, sources in the southern port said by telephone. The city was claimed by the Base Resistance, a group allied with Haiti's opposition Democratic Platform but not tied to the rebels. The sources said shots were fired but the police fled without shooting back.
Cities taken so far
Haiti's rebellion erupted Feb. 5 in western Gonaives, the fourth-largest city, and on Sunday the second largest, the northern port of Cap-Haitien, fell with little resistance.
Rebel leader Guy Philippe, speaking to an Associated Press reporter in Cap-Haitien, said his forces were converging on Port-au-Prince and would attack if Aristide did not resign.
"We're just going to take our positions and wait for the right time [to attack]," said Philippe, a former officer in the disbanded army who was Aristide's assistant police chief for northern Haiti. "They're awaiting the order."
About 80 people, half of them police officers, have been killed in the rebellion, which was launched by a street gang in Gonaives that says it was armed by Aristide to terrorize opponents.
Aristide told CNN he wouldn't quit. He also said it wouldn't take much international aid to crush the insurgency, one of whose commanders is former death squad leader Louis-Jodel Chamblain.
"From my point of view, if we have a couple of dozen of international soldiers, police, together right now, it could be enough to send a positive signal to those terrorists," Aristide said. "Once they realize the international community refuses [to allow] the terrorists to keep killing people, we can prevent them to kill more people."
Caribbean appeal
Jamaica's Foreign Minister K.D. Knight, speaking for the 15-nation Caribbean Community that includes Haiti, on Thursday appealed at the U.N. Security Council for immediate assistance.
But Powell and his counterparts from France and Canada said Haiti's government and opposition must reach a political agreement before peacekeepers go.
"The solution should be a political one supported by a multinational civilian force," said France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere. "If we reverse the sequence, it will be much more difficult to find a political solution."
Aristide's foreign minister and chief of staff were in Paris to meet with Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin.
Haiti's crisis has brewed since Aristide's party swept flawed legislative elections in 2000 and international donors froze millions of dollars in aid.
Aristide agreed last week to a U.S.-backed peace plan in which he would share power with the political opposition. But the opposition rejected the proposal Wednesday.
U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla., said the U.S. government's policy is "totally incoherent."
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, visiting Libya, urged the United States to protect Aristide.
"Unless something happens immediately, the president could be killed," Jackson said. "We must not allow that to happen to that democracy. We must give the best troops to Haiti to protect the president's compound."
Foreigners fled country
Many foreigners and Haitians fled the country Thursday.
Americans with M-16s guarded a convoy of U.N. workers and their families on the way to Port-au-Prince's airport, passing barricades of wrecked cars, rocks and tires built by Aristide supporters to block rebels.
Military helicopters of the Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, ferried people from the Dominican Embassy to the crowded airport.
Brazil dispatched Marines to evacuate South American citizens and protect its embassy. The United States and Canada have also sent troops to evacuate citizens and guard embassy property.
Late Thursday, American Airlines canceled flights between Haiti and the United States until March 3.
Businesses were shuttered, long lines formed at the few open banks and gas stations, and streets were mostly devoid of people.
Aristide, a former priest of Haiti's slums who in 1990 became the country's first freely elected leader, has lost popularity amid accusations he condoned corruption, failed to help the poor and had thugs attack political opponents.
But he has retained loyalty among some Haitians.
Haitians were fleeing their country in boats. The U.S. Coast Guard intercepted a dozen small boats carrying 546 Haitians near the Haitian coast this week, spokesman Luis Diaz said.
"It doesn't appear to be a mass exodus," Diaz said.