Policemen killed at start of Haiti carnival

PORT-AU-PRINCE - Gunmen attacked a police patrol and killed four policemen in the Haitian capital and at least four other people were shot dead as the country's three-day carnival celebration began, police and witnesses said on Monday.

The killings highlighted continuing instability nearly a year after ex-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide fled into exile, pushed out by an armed revolt and US pressure. More than 240 people have died in political and gang violence since early September.

The four officers, who had been assigned to protect a music band as it headed to join the main downtown parade, were killed in the residential Clercine neighbourhood late on Sunday, not far from a base for UN peacekeepers, said police chief Leon Charles on Monday.

Two other police officers were wounded, he said.

A police spokeswoman, Jessie Coicou, said the attackers had been identified as former members of the military, which was disbanded a decade ago. Other police sources said the attackers wore army uniforms and were riding a green pick-up truck.

The leader of the former military, Remissainthe Ravix, said in a statement on a local radio station that no former soldiers were involved.

Former troops, now a rag-tag rebel force that pushed out Aristide, still hold sway in parts of the country of 8 million people.

At least four other people were shot dead late on Sunday or early on Monday. Witnesses saw the bodies of three men and a woman lying on the street in downtown Port-au-Prince on Monday morning. It was not known who shot them or why.

In other incidents, shots were fired near several points of the carnival route late on Sunday, panicking crowds taking part in Haiti's big annual party, a colourful festival of masks and drums in the impoverished Caribbean country.

The shooting appeared to be mostly aimed at scaring people since it was not necessarily directed at the crowd, said Coicou, the police spokeswoman. Hospital sources said at least 10 people were wounded.

Many of the shots came from Bel-Air, a stronghold of Aristide supporters where there is still anger at his ouster. Several armed groups from pro-Aristide slums had threatened to disturb carnival festivities.

Hundreds of Haitian policemen and about 600 Brazilian peacekeepers were deployed in the capital to protect people going to the pre-Lenten party that ends on Mardi Gras, UN mission spokesman Damian Onzes-Cardona told Reuters on Monday.

The Brazilian-led UN peacekeeping force numbers about 6000 soldiers and 1400 police nationwide.

Crowds seemed smaller than usual for the start of carnival. It was not clear whether this was because people were afraid, or protesting.

Some Aristide supporters said they were not in the mood for carnival, complaining many of their relatives and friends were being jailed arbitrarily -- which the interim government of Prime Minister Gerard Latortue has repeatedly denied.

- REUTERS