Incident At Baie Du Mesle

By MARGUERITE MICHAELS

Under a glistening moon, the 60-ft. sailboat St. Joseph, moored off a spit of land on the southern coast of Haiti, was quickly loading its human cargo. Suddenly the silence of the night was broken by the sound of an approaching military boat. At first the people on the sailboat froze in fear, hoping the patrol would pass. But when three shots rang out, the St. Joseph headed toward open water, its crew and passengers in panic. Rushing from one side to the other to get away from the gunfire, many people fell or were pushed overboard. Then, when the boat was a few hundred yards from shore, the sail's boom broke free and swept across the deck, knocking scores more into the sea. The four policemen who had tried to stop the voyage saw the chaos and sped away, leaving hundreds in the water.

"I fell off when the shots were fired," said Viola Cuprian, 23. "I can't swim. I thought I was going to die. People were crying and screaming everywhere." Horrified villagers from nearby Baie du Mesle saved dozens with quickly dispatched dugout canoes. But the rescuers estimate that at least 65 people drowned, probably more. Jean Bercharles, 25, lost seven members of his family, including a brother, sister and several cousins. "We do not know how many are dead because the ship left so quickly we don't know who got on and ( who died," said 23-year-old schoolteacher Sanon Janot. "We found bodies along the shore all day, and many we know were taken by the currents out to sea. Some of the dead came from far away and have no families who can name them."

It was the most terrifying episode in a week when Haitians fled their stricken country in record numbers. More than 5,000 refugees took to boats during the week; on Monday alone, 1,486 were picked up at sea, the largest single number in one day since the September 1991 military coup that overthrew President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. With the current processing center on a Navy ship off Jamaica already jammed, President Bill Clinton was forced to reopen the old facilities at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Station in Cuba to handle the overflow. "This should have been anticipated," said Ernest Preeg, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies and a former U.S. ambassador to Haiti. "And I think the surge will continue to escalate."

The exodus was triggered by the change in Clinton's refugee policy that went into effect three weeks ago. Rather than automatically being sent back to Haiti, refugees would be interviewed to determine whether they were entitled to political asylum. Word spread quickly in Haiti that those who could get a boat and make it a few miles out to sea would be picked up by the Americans and would stand a much better chance of making it to the U.S. So far, 1 out of 4 refugees interviewed at sea has been granted asylum, in contrast to just 10% for those applying for refugee status at the U.S. processing center in Port- au-Prince.

This has given encouragement to poor Haitians, oppressed by the military regime and by the economic deprivation worsened by U.S. sanctions. In the area around the village of Baie du Mesle, more than 400 refugees were waiting in coves and along the barren hillsides for passage to America. Last week's ill- fated escape attempt was put together hurriedly over two days, using a boat that had been in the village for more than a year; four other refugee boats have been sent to sea in the past two years. "We know that if we take to the boats it will help Aristide," says a villager. "No one told us this, we just know it is true. We are not afraid to die in the sea if it helps to return Aristide."

Though for weeks they have touted the success of the trade embargo on Haiti, Clinton Administration officials were loath to blame the sanctions for the fresh flood of boat people. William Gray, Clinton's special adviser to Haiti, insisted that the principal cause of the exodus was political repression. "Do sanctions hurt? Yes, they do," he said. "But dictatorships kill." Still working to isolate the country's military leaders and force them from power, Clinton applied more pressure last week, revoking the visas of most Haitians hoping to travel to the U.S. -- not just from Haiti but from other countries as well.

Calling the mass exodus a political action, Haitian soldiers have been searching for and destroying boats that are being readied to carry refugees. In Washington, meanwhile, Aristide continued to speak out against Clinton's appeals to Haitians not to flee the country. "It would be immoral to ask people whose very lives are at risk to stay in Haiti," he said, "a Haiti I am compelled to describe as a house on fire."

To handle the refugees, Clinton not only reopened Guantanamo Bay but also sent a second ship to Jamaica. Another processing center on Grand Turk Island, north of Haiti, is set to open as well. As Washington continues to look for other land-based centers in the Caribbean, U.S. officials are asking such countries as Canada, Australia and Britain to accept some Haitians for resettlement.

In the meantime, boats are being prepared in nearly every village along the southern coast of Haiti, as people descend from all over the island, many having sold everything they own to raise the 300 gourdes ($100) to come to America. Their goal is to put more pressure on the U.S. to hasten the return of Aristide. "We cannot get arms to fight," says a villager. "The only way to fight is to get the Americans to keep their promises. The only way to do that is to do what they fear most."

With reporting by Edward Barnes/Baie du Mesle and Ann M. Simmons/Washington