President Clinton has left open the possibility the United States might let Haiti's military rulers yield power and go into exile without punishment.
"We have always said . . . that we had no interest in trying to persecute anybody," Clinton said about a report he might allow payoffs to junta leaders to leave.
"We are still looking at any number of options to try to restore democracy to Haiti," Clinton said Monday on NBC's Today. What "happens to those who violate the law" depends in part on deposed president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
"There's no plan to pay them off," said White House press secretary Dee Dee Myers. But "I just can't rule anything in or out at this point."
Aristide was ousted Sept. 30, 1991, in a military coup.
Under a U.N.-brokered accord signed by coup leader Lt. Gen. Raoul Cedras and Aristide in July 1993, coup leaders would leave power and get amnesty and Aristide would return. Military rulers reneged on the pact in October.
In Haiti, The Associated Press, quoting an unidentified military-linked source, reported there are no signs of unrest. It reported the troika at the top - Cedras, Col. Michel Francois and Gen. Philippe Biamby - would be staying put.
The source told AP that, while it is widely known that Cedras has wanted to resign for some time, neither Biamby nor Francois has any intention of stepping down.
Meanwhile, Canadian officials said they will train 100 exiled Haitians to be the core of a police force to go into Haiti if democracy is restored.
In Kingston, Jamaica, refugee advocates Randall Robinson and Robert Rubin on Monday visited the U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort, anchored there for the processing of Haitian refugees.
Three Haitian boats were intercepted by the U.S. Coast Guard while fleeing Haiti. Their 55 passengers arrive in Kingston today.
Rubin, a member of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights, is in Jamaica to check out the processing operation.
A hunger by Robinson, executive director of the Africa and Caribbean lobbying group TransAfrica, pressured Clinton into dropping his policy of automatically returning fleeing Haitians, without allowing them to plead their cases for political asylum.
Robinson pronounced himself "not very pleased" with what he had seen of the processing system, saying Haitians must meet a higher standard than other refugee groups to gain asylum in the USA and have no meaningful way to appeal a rejection.
