President of Haiti says quake death toll could be 100,000

THE DEATH toll in the earthquake that devastated Haiti on Tuesday could surpass 100,000, René Préval, the president of the beleaguered island nation of nine million said yesterday.

The Department of Foreign Affairs, meanwhile, said all 18 Irish citizens known to be in the country are alive and well.

Mr Préval said he saw piles of corpses as he walked the streets of his capital, Port-au-Prince, and that the consequences of the quake were “unimaginable.” Eyewitnesses spoke of moans and muffled cries emerging from pancaked buildings. Survivors dug with their bare hands to rescue trapped victims.

Crowds formed in open spaces, because people had no homes to return to or were afraid that weakened structures would collapse upon them. The images that reached us via television screens were of limbs protruding from rubble, faces disfigured by grief and shock, bleary-eyed survivors coated with cement dust, lacerated and bleeding bodies.

All of the capital’s hospitals were destroyed or abandoned because they were unsafe, and aid groups set up makeshift hospital tents alongside them. The aid groups did what they could to help, but were also busy searching for their own dead and missing. Humanitarian workers who tried to travel by car described being mobbed by crowds seeking help.

Robyn Fieser, the regional information officer for Catholic Relief Services, said relief workers in Haiti told her “all they heard last night was chanting and praying. All they saw was people doing rescue work on their own, with their bare hands”.

The centre of the white, wedding cake-style presidential palace collapsed. So did the other main symbol of authority in Haiti, the United Nations headquarters, with 100 to 150 people still unaccounted for, according to the organisation.

Fires burned across the city, which was without running water, electricity or telecommunications.

The homes of more affluent Haitians, which have concrete roofs, turned out to be death-traps, while the corrugated steel lean-tos in the slums were less dangerous. The initial quake was over 7 on the Richter scale, and it was followed by some 30 after-shocks of up to 4.5 magnitude.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said he was “very concerned”, including about the fate of some 1,200 Brazilian members of the 7,000-strong UN stabilisation mission in Haiti, which Brazil leads.

Alain Le Roy, the head of peacekeeping operations, said 3,000 peacekeepers were patrolling the city, and had secured the airport and port. But some 4,000 dangerous criminals were freed by the collapse of prison buildings, and there were reports of looting.

It was the worst earthquake to strike the island of Hispaniola, which Haiti shares with the Dominican Republic, in 200 years. Before the tremor, the mayor of Port-au Prince had said 60 per cent of the capital’s buildings were unsafe.

What US President Barack Obama called a “cruel and incomprehensible tragedy” caps a history of insurrections and natural disasters, including four hurricanes that flooded much of the country in late 2008.

As the extent of the catastrophe became apparent, a major international relief operation was mounted, with rescue teams and supplies being dispatched to Haiti from across the world. The scale of the task facing relief workers was underlined by a Red Cross estimate that about three million people were in need of emergency help. Mr Obama extended “the deep condolences and unwavering support” of the American people to Haiti and ordered US agencies to undertake a “swift, co-ordinated” effort to get aid to the country. A US navy aircraft carrier is expected to reach Haiti in a couple of days.

Declarations of financial aid for Haiti – the western hemisphere’s poorest country – came from across the globe. The UN released $10 million from its emergency fund, while the European Commission approved €3 million of fast-track funding.