Rebels converge on Haitian capital

Rebels who have launched a bloody uprising took control of another town today, closing in on the capital as Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide appealed for foreign peacekeepers and the country lurched toward chaos.

The rebels drove police out and freed about 67 prisoners in Mireblais, about 30 miles southeast of Port-au-Prince, according to witnesses.

It was unclear whether the rebels were still in the town or whether they were pushing toward the capital.

Police abandoned Haiti’s third-largest city, Les Cayes yesterday.

The city was claimed by the Base Resistance, an anti-government group allied with Haiti’s opposition Democratic Platform but not tied to the rebels. Shots were fired, but there was no gunbattle before the police fled.

Aristide supporters gathered in front of the National Palace early today to protect Haiti’s embattled leader. Teenagers driving bulldozers and forklifts built barricades of wrecked cars, telephone poles, chairs, garbage and burning tyres.

“If Aristide goes, cut off their heads and burn down their houses!” Aristide loyalists shouted outside the National Palace, echoing the war cry of Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the Haitian general who ousted French colonisers to end slavery 200 years ago.

In Washington, US Secretary of State Colin Powell came close to telling Aristide he should bow out as president 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.

Haiti’s rebellion erupted on February 5 in western Gonaives, the fourth-largest city, and on Sunday the second largest, the northern port of Cap-Haitien, was taken with little resistance.

Rebel leader Guy Philippe said his forces were already converging on Port-au-Prince and would attack if Aristide did not resign.

Many foreigners and Haitians fled the country yesterday. American special agents with M-16s guarded a convoy of UN workers and their families on the way to Port-au-Prince’s airport, passing street barricades.

In Paris, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin was holding talks today with leaders of Haiti’s government on how to end the crisis.

De Villepin, who seized the initiative on Wednesday by calling for the immediate establishment of an interim government and an international civilian force to back it up, was meeting with a delegation led by Foreign Minister Joseph Antonio.

De Villepin was likely to explore ideas for new leadership. The top aide of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Jean-Claude Desgranges, was also in Paris.