Gunfire erupts during Powell visit to Haiti

Port-AU-PRINCE - Shooting erupted outside Haiti's presidential palace while US Secretary of State Colin Powell was inside talking to the interim leaders of the violence-plagued country.

The gunfire broke out moments after Powell arrived for meetings with Prime Minister Gerard Latortue and President Boniface Alexandre at the palace in the run-down capital, although it was not known if it was connected to the visit.

UN troops guarding the palace also opened fire. The UN force has been deployed to keep order since the government was installed in March after a bloody rebellion and US pressure forced President Jean-Bertrand Aristide into exile.

US officials said it was unclear whether the shooting was aimed at the palace or was connected with Powell's visit.

Speaking to reporters after the incident, Powell said it was essential that the UN force be built up to full strength and that it actively engage the gunmen, who still hold sway in many parts of the impoverished Caribbean state.

The United Nations authorized more than 8300 soldiers and police but only 6000 have been sent.

"They have to forcefully take on these armed individuals of the kind who were firing this morning," Powell said.

The mission has been criticized for being reluctant to intervene in the violence that has gripped Haiti since Aristide left. More than 200 people have been killed in the last three months in gang and political violence.

Witnesses said dozens of shots were fired in sustained bursts over several minutes, many of them in Bel-Air, a slum two blocks from the palace.

Haitian Justice Minister Bernard Gousse and a palace security guard said shots were fired from a car passing outside the stately white building in downtown Port-au-Prince and then UN security forces opened fire.

"The palace was never under attack," said Carlos Chagas, an assistant to the commander of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Haiti. "There was some shooting in Bel-Air and UN troops, for some reason, opened fire."

Dozens of UN troops surrounded the palace and others moved into the slum in armored vehicles, witnesses said.

Two people were shot and killed - one during a police raid in Bel-Air and another who was found dead on a sidewalk. Three students inside a Bel-Air school were injured by gunfire.

A State Department official in Washington said supporters of Aristide's Lavalas Family party were suspected to be behind the gunfire, but the official said this was not confirmed.

Haiti has been in turmoil this year, which was supposed to have been a celebration of the 200th anniversary of independence from France.

Powell's visit was meant to show Haiti's importance to Washington, despite the US decision to withdraw the bulk of its forces earlier this year in favor of the Brazilian-led peacekeeping mission. The United States has three military personnel and one Coast Guard official with the mission.

Latortue's interim government has been accused of arbitrarily jailing hundreds of members of Aristide's Lavalas Family political party.

However, Powell said Lavalas, a broad grass-roots movement that twice swept Aristide to power, must be included in the political process that is expected to lead to national elections next year.

- REUTERS