Haiti

Rush for jobs in Haiti kills 1 and injures 23

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - A stampede at a police academy recruiting drive killed one person and injured 23 in Haiti, officials said Wednesday.

Police fired tear gas and beat back applicants with batons as thousands of job hunters rushed the academy Tuesday, crashing through the gates and past French guards. U.S. Marines helped to control the crowd by blocking the academy entrance with Humvees.

Meanwhile, the Bahamas withdrew its diplomats from Haiti, after the shooting and robbery of its ambassador's wife and a threatening telephone call to the wife of a second diplomat, a government spokesman told the Associated Press on Wednesday on condition of anonymity.

During the stampede, Jerry Prophete, 23, fell and was trampled to death, said police Commissioner Jean-Yonel Trecile, who said 23 were injured and eight were hospitalized.

As many as 4,000 applicants showed up for the first day of the recruiting drive Monday. The numbers swelled to as many as 15,000 people Tuesday, Trecile said.

Trecile said police had not anticipated the turnout, but said the job hunters were partly to blame. "At one point they went wild," he said.

He said some officers from the riot squad Monday were taking bribes to allow would-be recruits through the gates of the academy. Trecile said police were investigating.

Most of the impoverished Caribbean country's 8-million people are without jobs and live on less than $1 a day.

The police recruiting drive has been postponed until Monday, when applicants will be divided among three locations and by the first letter of their last names.

Haiti's interim government began the drive to replenish a depleted force that fled before a rebel advance in February. Hundreds have deserted, some fearing reprisal attacks because of their loyalties to ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

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