COCAINE FURTHERS SETBACKS IN HAITI

Operation Restore Democracy, a 1994 invasion of Haiti by 20,000 American
troops, had another key objective - to stop the flow of U.S.-bound cocaine
through what was then becoming a premier Caribbean drug hub.

Six years later, drug shipments through Haiti have soared to unprecedented
levels, the latest in a series of setbacks to buffet the desperately poor
nation that has seen U.S. troops depart and its fledgling democracy wither
with a series of fraud-tainted elections.

"Haiti is a narco-state, no different than Panama was under [Manuel]
Noriega, when the state powers, the banks and the police were either
acquiescing or actively participating in narco-trafficking," said one U.S.
official, who asked not to be named.

Haiti's emergence as a major player in the drug trade marks yet another
blemish on the $2-billion-plus invested by the United States on the U.S.
intervention that was once hailed by President Clinton as one of his
administration's greatest foreign-policy achievements.

Now, international observers refuse to recognize the results of recent
parliamentary elections, and, without a functioning democracy, hundreds of
millions of dollars in international aid remains frozen.

Haiti's growing drug trade gives rise to suspicions that cash earned by
helping satisfy America's appetite for cocaine has become a
quasi-substitute for missing foreign aid.

"I've seen no interest anywhere in the Haitian government about getting the
international aid unfrozen," said a foreign diplomat in Haiti during a
discussion on drug profits.

No one compares former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the ousted leader
who returned with American GIs six years ago, with Noriega, the former
president of Panama captured in a 1989 U.S. invasion and subsequently
sentenced to 40 years in a Florida prison on drug charges.

U.S. officials say they have no evidence to implicate Mr. Aristide in the
movement of an estimated 7 tons of cocaine each month through Haiti, a
transshipment point midway between Colombia and the United States.

Much of the suspicion instead focuses on Danny Toussaint, a confidant of
Mr. Aristide's who won a Senate seat in May elections. Mr. Toussaint has
long been known to U.S. authorities.

U.S. police arrested him during his 1997 visit to Miami, believing he had
been involved in a series of political assassinations in Haiti.

Released a few days later on a technicality - the U.S. intelligence
community declined to share its evidence with the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) -throngs of chanting supporters lifted him on
their shoulders when he returned to Port-au-Prince.

Today, Mr. Toussaint leads a classified list, now circulating in the
Clinton administration and on Capitol Hill, of five prominent Haitians
believed involved in drug trafficking.

Others on the five-man list include:

- - Medard Joseph, a former major in the Haitian army and, like Mr.
Toussaint, a leader of Mr. Aristide security detail. Also like Mr.
Toussaint, Mr. Joseph was elected to Haiti's Senate in May.

- - Jean-Marie Fourel Celestin, was elected senator as well. Mr. Fourel
Celestin gained notoriety outside Haiti in 1995 when Mr. Aristide nominated
him to be the nation's chief of police. Parliament rejected the nomination,
believing him tainted by drug trafficking and corruption. Cocaine comes to
the southern coast of the impoverished island on a 430-mile trip from
Colombia, often by decrepit fishing boats and lately in shiny speedboats.

It moves through Haiti, either overland on trucks that navigate around
axle-deep potholes, or by planes that readily turn rare strips of good
roads into nighttime runways.

The white powder sealed in plastic either leaves Haiti's north coast, bound
for Miami 600 miles away, or moves through the neighboring Dominican
Republic en route to Puerto Rico.

Some lawmakers on Capitol Hill are especially concerned.

"The drug situation in Haiti continues to get worse," said Sen. Mike
DeWine, Ohio Republican.

Mr. DeWine, who has made numerous trips to Haiti and has been briefed by
U.S. intelligence officials regarding Haiti's drug situation, declined to
discuss names on the list. But his frustration with Haiti's present rulers
was evident.

"My position for some time has been that we need to bypass the [Haitian]
government," he said.

The present government, led by Mr. Aristide's handpicked successor, Rene
Preval, adamantly denies any involvement in drug trafficking.