Sunday January 17, 2010
GENEROUS GIFT: Sandra Bullock donates $1 million to Haiti relief. 8A
Managing Editor: Sherrie Dockery sdockery@hpe.com (336) 888-3539
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Hillary Clinton reviews Haiti relief efforts PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton flew into the Haitian capital Saturday to confer with President Rene Preval and receive an update on earthquake relief efforts. She arrived in a Coast Guard C-130 transport carrying bottled water, packaged food, soap and other supplies, the highest-ranking Obama administration official to visit since the magnitude-7.0 quake struck Tuesday. When asked by reporters aboard her aircraft what she hoped to accomplish, Clinton said she wanted to “listen to him, to be sure we are as responsive as we need to be.”
Haiti aid flows
Canada to speed up Haiti immigration requests TORONTO – The Canadian government says it will expedite immigration applications from Haitians with family in Canada and give immigration priority to Haitians adversely affected by the devastating earthquake. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Saturday that Haitians currently in Canada temporarily will also be allowed to extend their stay. Canada will also prioritize pending adoption cases with the visa office in Port-au-Prince. Canada will open a satellite immigration office in Dominican Republic to help facilitate the immigration process.
UN: Earthquake worst in available resources GENEVA – A U.N. spokeswoman says the United Nations is finding the Haitian earthquake to be the worst disaster it has had to face in terms of the resources available for its relief work. Elisabeth Byrs says U.N. and government buildings and infrastructure have been destroyed. She says many civil servants were killed. Byrs says the government losses make it harder for relief agencies to work than even after the Asian tsunami of 2004.
Senegal offers land to those who want to come DAKAR, Senegal – Senegal is offering free land to Haitians wishing to ‘return to their origins’ following this week’s devastating earthquake, which has destroyed the capital and buried thousands of people beneath rubble. Senegal’s octogenarian President Abdoulaye Wade told a meeting of his advisers that Haitians are the sons and daughters of Africa, because the country was founded by slaves, including some believed to have come from Senegal.
Outside Haiti capital, much despair, little aid LEOGANE, Haiti – As aid masses in Haiti’s devastated capital, time is running out in rural areas where the damage is no less severe. In Leogane, frustrated men gathered Saturday with machetes and clubs, ready to fight for a town they said the world has forgotten. All along the cracked highway heading west from Port-au-Prince along the bay, people begged for help. “SOS,” declared a sign near Leogane. “We don’t understand why everything is going to Port-au-Prince, because Leogane was broken too.” ENTERPRISE NEWS SERVICE REPORTS
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A Canadian soldier carries supplies as troops arrive at a temporary medical center in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday.
Some feuds erupt over water, food, logistics PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) – Hungry, haggard survivors clamored – and sometimes fought – for food and water Saturday as donors squabbled over how to get aid into Haiti and rescuers waged an increasingly improbable battle to free the dying before they become the dead. Haiti’s government alone has already recovered 20,000 bodies – not counting those recovered by independent agencies or relatives themselves, Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive told The Associated Press. He said a final toll of 100,000 dead would “seem to be the minimum.” There were growing signs that foreign aid and rescue workers were getting to the people most in need – even those buried deep be-
Elsewhere...
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Obama, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush stand united for Haiti. 6A neath collapsed buildings – while others struggled to cope with the countless bodies still left on the streets. Crowds of Haitians thronged around foreign workers shoveling through piles of wreckage at shattered buildings throughout the city, using sniffer dogs, shovels and in some cases heavy earthmoving equipment. Searchers poked a camera on a wire thorough a hole at the collapsed Hotel Montana and spot-
ted three people who were still alive, and they heard the voice of a woman speaking French, said Ecuadorean Red Cross worker David Betancourt. The urgency was growing, however: On a back street in Port-auPrince, about a half dozen young men ripped water pipes off walls to suck out the small amount of water trapped inside. “This is very, very bad, but I am too thirsty,” said Pierre Louis Delmar. Bellerive said an estimated 300,000 people are living on the streets in port-au-Prince and “Getting them water, and food, and a shelter is our top priority.” The U.S. military operating Haiti’s damaged main airport said it can now handle 90 flights a day.