PORT-AU-PRINCE, Feb. 28 (IPS) – When a group of peasant farmers seized some 50 hectares of land in the northern town of Milot last month, Haiti’s newly-trained lawmen responded quickly – but just as violently as did the police force of previous times.

To breakup the squatters, police fired shots from handguns and waded into the crowd with truncheons – beating and seriously wounding three peasants, according to the town’s recently elected mayor, Jean Charles Moise. Five demonstrators were arrested.

‘’Police mustn’t use force as the only way to resolve problems,’’ complained Moise, echoing criticism by other Haitians of the recently-deployed and Haitian National Police (HNP).

‘’We don’t want another repressive police force.’’

Government and U.N. officials, along with human rights groups, have expressed increasing concerned at the operations of the 6,200- strong police force, which was quickly trained and installed across the country in the last 15 months.

‘’There is a problem of authority, there is a problem of regulations, of organization, of respect for equipment, of respect for the civil population, and there is a problem with of the application of sanctions when the police don’t do their work,’’ noted Father Daniel Roussiere of the Justice and Peace Commission, a Roman Catholic Church group.

‘’We are now entering into a spiral where the police do what they want, when they want, without anybody exercising any control,’’ he said.

More than a dozen people have died and many others have been injured by police actions in the past six months, U.N. officials said. Also, of some 90 brand new pick-up trucks donated to the HNP just a few months ago, 50 are already out of commission, according to a recent survey by Haiti’s weekly Creole-language newspaper, Libete (Liberty).

More alarming are the incidents like those in Milot and during the pre-lent carnival last week. As tens of thousands of revelers here ended three days of festivities, police fired into the crowd, creating a panic that ended with one person dead and some 50 wounded.

U.N. Secretary General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, commented on the problems in the police force in a report last month .

He said that starting with a lack of competent leadership there was also a ‘’..the disproportionate use of force in carrying out police duties; lack of experience in the legitimate use of force in carrying out police duties; lack of experience in legitimate use of firearms; inappropriate methods of crowd control; and insufficient use of techniques for the peaceful settlement of disputes.’’

In his Jan 25 report to the U.N. General Assembly Boutros-Ghali said that, “disciplinary measures for transgressors by individual police agents have, for the most part, not been forthcoming.”

The International Criminal Investigations Training and Assistance Program (ICITAP), a U.S. agency under the direction of the U.S. Justice Department and the State Department, has been conducting the selection and training of the new Haitian police as part of a five-year, USD 50 million project.

Formed in 1986 to provide training for the El Salvador police, ICITAP is closely linked to U.S. security agencies, especially the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). But it is also staffed by narcotics agents, U.S. Secret Service and local law enforcement personnel. In recent years, ICITAP has provided training to police forces in Colombia and Panama.

ICITAP officials were not available for comment on the progress of the Haitian training programme which was launched shortly after 20,000 US-led troops ousted Haiti’s bloody military dictatorship and restored President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in the autumn of 1994.

Haiti’s once 7,000-strong military force was disbanded and only an army band now remains of the once all-poerful unit.

Diplomatic sources here said the main technical problem with the new police was the lack of leadership. Three police chiefs, and three justice ministers, have come and gone in the past year and new appointments are awaiting parliamentary approval.

At the same time, the Haitian government and Washington have been locked in a protracted battle over the composition of the police hierarchy, with each side wanting senior officers to their liking, the sources said.

Father Daniel Roussiere, of the Justice and Peace Commission, argues that many of the problems started at the recruitment phase. ICITAP monopolized the process without the participation and monitoring of Haitian human rights groups, a trend that has continued throughout the training and deployment of the force, he alleged.

Roussiere, like Milot Mayor Jean Charles Moise, also noted that there is a lack of respect for the police by many Haitians. As often as police abuse civilians, people attack the police, in a kind of ‘’social negotiation’’ that is defining the limits of

power on both sides.

But some observers fear there might not be a settlement and the police, like the army it’s replacing, may descend rapidly into a repressive force.

‘’We don’t want the same kind of security force that the Haitian people struggled against for so long,’’ said Moise.

‘’The police must respect the people, and the people must respect the police. Otherwise, we’re going to see a blood bath,’’ he warned. (END/IPS/dc/mk/96)

Origin: Rome/HAITI-HUMAN RIGHTS/ ----

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