3 killed in quake in northern Haiti

March 22, 2010|ASSOCIATED PRESS

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A small earthquake in northern Haiti collapsed an apartment building and killed three people in Cap-Haïtien early yesterday, a UN official said.

UN spokesman Louicius Eugene said six people were pulled out of the rubble but three of them died. The other three were taken to a hospital.

Haitian police, civil protection authorities, and UN peacekeepers are searching for more survivors in Cap-Haïtien, the country’s second-largest city.

The US Geological Survey had no record of the earthquake. Geophysicist Jessica Sigala said yesterday that the agency would have registered any quake of magnitude 4.5 or greater in Haiti. Cap-Haïtien lies on the fault line that produced three moderate earthquakes in Cuba on Saturday. It was not affected by the Jan. 12 earthquake.

Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, former US presidents, will visit Haiti today. Tapped by President Obama to lead the US fund-raising response to the Jan. 12 earthquake, they are making the one-day visit to assess recovery.

The pair will arrive in a country struggling to feed and shelter victims of the magnitude-7 quake, which killed an estimated 230,000 people. Hundreds of thousands still live in dangerous camps, some already flooding ahead of the April rainy season.

Supporters of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the president ousted in 2004, have scheduled protests for today demanding his return and pleading for more aid. President René Préval has criticized nongovernmental organizations for not being accountable to the Haitian state. In turn, Haitian officials have been accused of ineffectiveness and corruption.