US Secretary of State Colin Powell said Washington was trying to find a replacement for Haitian Prime Minister Yvon Neptune, as US Marines came under fire while patrolling the still volatile Haitian capital.
"We are working hard with the new council of eminent persons that has been created to come up with a new prime minister," Powell said late Monday in an interview with the US Fox News Channel.
Powell expressed regret that exiled Haitian president Jean Bertrand Aristide had "squandered the opportunity that was given to him by the presence of American troops and by the international community that stuck with it for years."
"But this time, I hope we can come out with a better political arrangement," he said.
Under a plan approved by the US, France and the Organization of American States, a council of eminent persons is responsible for forming a new Haitian government that would be neutral and independent.
Yesterday, the council and supreme court chief Boniface Alexandre, who on Monday was formally inaugurated as interim president, are expected to recommend a new prime minister.
Powell also delivered a sharp rebuke to Aristide, who said in Bangui on Monday that he was ousted by a US-French-orchestrated coup, insisting that he was still the elected president of Haiti and calling for "peaceful resistance to restore constitutional order" in his country.
"Mr. Aristide, I think, if he really wants to serve his nation, he will serve it the way he did the night he decided to leave, by letting his nation get on with its future and not linger about its past," the US secretary of state said in response.
Meanwhile, US Marines came under fire Monday in the Haitian capital, while mobs went on a looting rampage near the international airport.
The Marines did not suffer casualties or return fire after about 10 shots were fired at them in the Bel Air neighborhood, an Aristide bastion.
The shooting occurred close to where four people were killed during an opposition demonstration on Sunday.
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