Aristide quits, US and Canada send troops, Dem Critics

BBC NEWS -- Embattled Aristide quits Haiti Events unfolded quickly on Sunday when an unmarked jet carrying Mr Aristide and his security chief left Port-au-Prince airport.

It later emerged that some of about 50 US Marines guarding the American embassy had escorted him to the plane.

U.S. Forces Expected to Land in Haiti Sunday Evening

A U.S. official had said preparations were being made to fly as many as 500 Marines from North Carolina to the unsettled country.

Dem Criticism of Bush as Marines deployed to Port-au-Prince

Speaking at a televised debate ahead of Super Tuesday's clutch of key nominating contests, Kerry said Bush was "late as usual" in dealing with Haiti after months of unrest and a three-week-old open revolt against Aristide.

Kerry said although Aristide made "plenty of mistakes" and let his police run amok, Bush essentially "empowered" the anti-Aristide insurgents by calling for both sides to reach a power-sharing agreement.

"So the result is that you almost inevitably had the clash that you have today," the Massachusetts lawmaker said. "And innocent Haitians, the people of Haiti, deserved better than that over the course of the last year."

North Carolina Senator Edwards said Bush had "ignored Haiti the same way he's ignored most of the countries in this hemisphere".

"We should have been engaged over a long period of time, in a serious way, at least through diplomacy, not to allow this to get to a crisis situation where it now is.

"At its worst, they [the Bush administration] actually facilitated the ouster of Aristide. Now the proper thing to do is for America to be part of the United Nations force to secure the country."

Civil rights activist Al Sharpton said successive US administrations had blocked Haiti from receiving badly needed resources through the World Bank and "almost set up a situation where Aristide had to fail."

Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich supported the US call for "international intervention" in Haiti but said it needed a Department of Peace to track brewing conflicts and "intervene in a nonviolent way before it gets out of hand."

Canadian troops take Port-au-Prince airport

Defense officials have declined to respond to media reports that Canada sent a unit of its elite Joint Task Force Two commandos to Haiti in the past week.