Police reinforcements fought bloody battles with gunmen as they tried to retake Haiti's fourth-largest city Saturday from rebels who seized it two days earlier in a bold challenge to President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
Journalists saw at least three police killed, and crowds mutilating the corpses. One body was dragged through the street as a man swung at it with a machete. A woman cut off the officer's ear.
Another officer was lynched, and residents dropped a large rock on his corpse, which was stripped to his shorts.
At least one bystander was wounded in the face by a police bullet, and he gushed blood on a hospital gurney while awaiting treatment. Haitian radio stations reported that rebels said they killed 14 police officers, but the reports could not be confirmed.
Meanwhile, the militants' uprising appeared to have spread to other nearby towns Saturday as armed Aristide opponents seized the police station in west-coast St. Marc, firing into the air and chasing police away, private Radio Kiskeya reported.
Militants also have attacked police stations and forced out police in at least five small towns near Gonaives, Haitian radio reports said. Judge Walter Pierre told private Radio Ginen that armed men were occupying the police station in the town of Anse Rouge on Saturday and had confiscated weapons.
An armed group known as the Gonaives Resistance Front evicted police Thursday from Gonaives' police station during a five-hour gun battle, then torched the station and other buildings. At least seven people were killed and 20 injured.
About 150 police re-entered Gonaives Saturday morning, ignoring a hail of rocks from protesters and waging gun battles with armed rebels who hid on side streets and crouched in doorways.
"I'm not a terrorist. I am fighting for the Haitian people," militant leader Wilfort Ferdinand, 27, said from a second-floor balcony, holding an M-16 rifle.
It was unclear how many gunmen were fighting, but on Friday thousands of protesters marched outside Gonaives, vowing to repel any attempt to retake the city, which with its suburbs encompasses about 200,000 people.
Some gunmen wore the camouflage pants of Haiti's disbanded army, which Aristide eliminated in 1995.
"I am ready to lay down my weapons as soon as Aristide leaves. Gonaives today is in the hands of the Resistance," Ferdinand said. "We are few in number but we have the support of the people."
The group is not asking for money or weapons, only international help in removing Aristide, he said. Ferdinand, known by the nickname Ti-Wil, said Aristide once gave his group weapons to crush the opposition.
The Gonaives Resistance Front used to be allied with Aristide. But the gang turned against Aristide last year and changed its name from the "Cannibal Army," accusing the government of killing its leader Amiot Metayer to keep him from releasing damaging information about Aristide. The government denies it.
The US Embassy issued a statement Friday saying it "categorically rejects all violence."
A number of people in Gon-aives, meanwhile, said they support the militants. Some said they formed neighborhood committees to support militants and questioned visitors.
"We have placed our trust in the Gonaives Resistance Front. If the police counterattack, they'll be met with stiff resistance," said Jean Roland, 23.
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