Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 4, 1993 TAG: 9307040209
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By From the Los Angeles Times and The Associated Press
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Medium
He put his signature alongside that of Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras, who had ousted him in September 1991. The agreement, hammered out during a week of U.N.-mediated negotiations in New York, would end a political crisis that has battered the country since Aristide's overthrow.
For much of the day, despite the morning signing by Cedras, the army commander who ousted Aristide in September 1991, American and U.N. diplomats were fearful that Aristide would scuttle the agreement, ending seven days of talks with nothing to show for it. But after pressure from U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutrous-GHali and U.S. Vice President Al Gore, Aristide changed his mind.
The agreement had been delayed for nearly 12 hours as negotiators and Aristide's delegation worked out a side letter that would allow the United NAtions to reimpose its embargo if it determines that human rights are not being respected. Aristide was also seeking assurances in writing that the U.N. would guarantee his safety after he returns to Haiti.
His advisers, however, made it clear that Aristide was still troubled by the plan's treatment of Cedras and other members of the Haitian military high command.
Cedras had insisted on retaining a role for the military, at least during a transition period. He finally agreed that the army high command and the chief of police, Col. Joseph Michel Francois, would step down as Aristide has demanded.
The U.N. plan called for the following:
Haitian political parties would meet to lay the groundwork for the new government.
Aristide would then nominate a new prime minister, whom Parliament would accept.
Parliament would adopt an amnesty law for the soldiers who overthrew Aristide.
The military high command and police chief would then resign.
Aristide would appoint a new military command.
An international advisory group would arrive in Haiti to help form an independent police force - the current force is an arm of the military - and to retrain the army as a force answerable to civilian authority. U.N. and other international aid to Haiti would resume.
On Oct. 30. Aristide would return to Port-au-Price, Haiti's capital.
The accord, if carried to a successful conclusion, would mark an unprecedented moment in Latin American history: No other president has been restored to power peacefully after his ouster by a military coup.
by CNB