Haiti wants 15-year-old U.S. arms embargo lifted

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Sep 16 (Reuters) Haiti's prime minister has asked Washington to lift the 15-year-old arms embargo that bars the troubled Caribbean country from buying U.S. weapons for its ill-equipped police force.

Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis said the ban was hurting Haiti's ability to ensure the safety of its 8 million people.

''How can the police be effective if they cannot get the weapons and armament they need to carry out their difficult mission?'' Alexis told Reuters yesterday. ''That's why we have asked the U.S. to lift the embargo.'' The embargo was imposed in 1991 after the Haitian military overthrew the government of then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. It was aimed at preventing the Haitian army and thugs accused of gross human rights abuses from obtaining weapons from the U.S. market.

U.S. Ambassador to Haiti Janet Sanderson said the embargo is still in place, although in 2005 the United States authorized the Haitian government to conditionally buy a limited quantity of weapons.

But U.S. officials in Haiti have prevented the Haitian government from taking possession of those two shipments of weapons, which are piled up in a warehouse at the police academy in the Petion-Ville suburb of the capital, Port-au-Prince.

The U.S. government wants Haitian authorities to first comply with conditions set by the U.S. Congress when the decision was made to allow the shipments to the violence-torn and impoverished country.

The weapons were required to remain under the embassy's care,'' Sanderson told Reuters. ''And those who would be allowed use those weapons should be vetted.'' Many members of the Haitian police force, including some who served in the Haitian military, have been accused of human rights violations.

One warehoused shipment was donated by the United States to the interim government that preceded the current administration. The second was purchased by Aristide during his second term as president, but shipping was delayed to 2005 because of the unrest that forced out Aristide in 2004.

Haitian and U.S. authorities also disagreed over the U.S.

policy of deporting Haitians who have served prison time in the United States, which Haiti considers a threat to its national security because it lacks the means to control them.

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