Militants loyal to President Jean-Bertrand Aristide attacked protesters demanding he resign with barrages of shotgun fire, rocks and bottles as diplomats presented a peace plan for which government and opposition leaders show little enthusiasm.
Scores of foreigners are streaming out of Haiti, acting on a warning from the US to flee mounting violence in government-held areas and threats of new rebel attacks in the north over Carnival weekend.
On Friday, anti-government protesters marched down the main road leading to Port-au-Prince international airport denouncing any plan that does not demand Aristide step down.
"Aristide's a scorpion," they chanted.
They were confronted by Aristide supporters who lobbed rocks and bottles and then opened fire.
About 14 people were injured and wounded, including a Haitian journalist shot twice in the back. Four foreign reporters were beaten up. One was slashed by a machete and only saved by his helmet.
Two of the key points of the international plan are disarming politically motivated street gangs and setting rules for political demonstrations.
Diplomats from a host of nations were to arrive Saturday to persuade Haiti's politicians to agree, apparently hoping that pressure from the two-week old popular uprising that has killed more than 60 people will impel them to a compromise they have resisted for years.
The plan was presented Friday, but even before it arrived both sides indicated reluctance.
"We don't expect much from the delegation," said opposition spokesman Paul Denis of the team to be led by Roger Noriega, the top US diplomat for the Western Hemisphere.
"If it wants to resolve the crisis the question of Aristide's resignation must be on the table," Denis said.
Aristide has shown determination to serve out his term that ends February 2006, and said he could not negotiate with "terrorists," repeating charges that the opposition supports the bloody rebellion.
On Friday, his government spokesman, Mario Dupuy, said "The government hopes the mission will be able to detach the opposition from acts and actors of violence ... the opposition has a chance to prove it is not in favor of violence and terrorism."
Aristide agreed months ago to the main tenets of the plan, then presented by the 15-nation Caribbean Community, but he has done nothing to act on it.
A key requirement is the appointment of a prime minister acceptable to both sides -- something they have not been able to agree on since flawed legislative elections in 2000 were swept by Aristide's Lavalas Party.
Aristide, who won Haiti's first free elections in a landslide in 1990, has lost support since his reelection. Haiti's chronic misery has deepened since international donors froze aid while Aristide is seen as condoning corruption that provides lavish lifestyles for government officials.
The former slum priest has responded to growing opposition by using police and armed gangs to stifle dissent and create a climate of fear.
In Haiti today, life appears more dangerous in places like the western port of St. Marc, where radio stations reported Aristide thugs torched 15 houses Thursday night, setting blazes that killed three people.
"Innocent people are being killed and houses are burned down every day and night in St. Marc and the police are doing nothing," said American missionary Terry Snow of Granbury, Texas.
In Cap-Haitien, the last major government bastion in the north, frightened police officers have barricaded themselves in their station and left the streets to armed government supporters terrorizing the population.
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