By Ben Barber
                      THE WASHINGTON TIMES

                           U.S. officials, having washed their hands of this week's
                      Haitian election, say they recognize their policies in the
                      impoverished Caribbean nation have failed and they are
                      casting about for a new direction.
                           "The story of Haiti is we tried and we failed," said one U.S.
                      official, who spoke yesterday on the condition he not be identified.
                           "The problem with Haiti is they want us to fix it, and that's not the
                      way you get things fixed."
                           A State Department official, who also asked to remain
                      anonymous, said: "People are taking a hard look at our Haiti
                      policy and what comes next."
                           Haiti was hailed as a triumph for Clinton administration policy
                      after U.S. troops landed there in 1994 to oust a military
                      dictatorship and restore the rule of the elected president,
                      Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
                           But relations have deteriorated so much that the United
                      States did not even send observers for Sunday's election, in
                      which Mr. Aristide is expected to have won a new term in the
                      face of a low turnout and an opposition boycott.
                           The latest voting follows elections to the Haitian senate in
                      May that the United States says failed to meet standards of
                      fairness.
                           Congress told the administration not to channel any
                      foreign aid through the Haitian government until the State
                      Department could certify that the outcome of those elections
                      had been free and fair.
                           Mr. Aristide's Lavalas party won 16 of the 17 seats then,
                      but about half the winners were short of the votes needed to
                      avoid runoff elections, according to international election
                      observers. Nevertheless, the Aristide-dominated election
                      commission certified them as winners.
                           Ten more senate seats were up for grabs Sunday, and
                      when results are tallied later this week it is expected that Mr.
                      Aristide's party will be declared winners. Opposition leaders
                      who boycotted the polls say the balloting was unfair and that
                      few people voted.
                           State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said
                      yesterday that U.S. foreign aid would continue to flow
                      through private relief agencies — not through the Haitian
                      government — until the election process meets the standards
                      set by the U.S. Congress.
                           "We believe in democracy in this hemisphere, as do many
                      others in this hemisphere, and we're willing to work on it,"
                      Mr. Boucher said at a briefing yesterday.
                           "But the flaws that are there [in Haiti] need to be remedied
                      by the local authorities.
                           "And there are a lot of indications — including low voter
                      turnout, the violence that was in the pre-election period —
                      that show that they need reconciliation within Haitian society."
                           The U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity
                      said Haiti was effectively a prisoner of its own history of
                      underdevelopment and dictatorship.
                           "Nobody has anything good to say about improving
                      conditions in Haiti," he said. "Haiti is considered a failure. It's
                      not that our aid programs didn't work. There's a sort of
                      psychology at work that we were never able to crack.
                           "We poured a lot of money into it and never were able to
                      turn it around. [President] Clinton tried to help. [House
                      International Relations Committee Chairman Benjamin A.]
                      Gilman fought us every step of the way. But that's not why
                      they failed.
                           "There's no group of people willing to take charge and
                      work with the problems."
                           Mr. Boucher also expressed exasperation.
                           "There is always a limit. You can't impose democracy. . . .
                           "People on the ground in the country have to make the
                      choice, have to make the decisions and have to take the steps
                      necessary to make democracy grow," he said.
                           The Agency for International Development (AID) is
                      sending $85 million in humanitarian aid via private agencies to
                      Haiti in the current year, said an AID official. The money
                      supplies hundreds of thousands of people their only meal of
                      the day.
                           Mr. Boucher said U.S. aid programs aim to increase
                      incomes for the poor, slow environmental degradation,
                      improve economic and education performance and support
                      the provision of health and family planning services, including
                      HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis programs.