Haiti's prime minister tonight appealed for international help, saying it is in the throes of a coup d'etat. France said it may send troops in but US Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell ruled out committing soldiers or police to halt a bloody uprising that threatens a fragile democracy.
He renewed his appeal for political settlement between President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and opposition groups.
Prime Minister Mr Yvon Neptune make his appeal after former soldiers joined the rebellion and seized the key central town of Hinche, raising the potential for a full-scale civil war.
"We are witnessing the coup d'etat machine in motion," Mr Neptune said in the capital Port-au-Prince. He said Haiti's 5,000-member police force was ill-equipped to respond and that he expected the international community "to show that it really wants peace and stability in Haiti."
He refused to say if that meant a military intervention, and President Jean-Bertrand Aristide said yesterday he had asked the Organisation of American States only for "technical assistance."
Rebels have driven police out of more than a dozen towns in 12 days and now control most roads in the Artibonite district, Haiti's breadbasket and home to almost one million of the country's eight million people. But Mr Powell said "there is frankly no enthusiasm right now for sending in military or police forces to put down the violence that we are seeing."
He said the international community wants to see "a political solution" and only then would willing nations offer a police presence to implement such an agreement.
France, Haiti's former coloniser, said it was weighing the risks of sending in peacekeepers.
PA