WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Jean-Bertrand Aristide, ousted as Haitian president on Sunday, told U.S. lawmakers and other contacts by telephone on Monday that he was abducted by U.S. soldiers and left his homeland against his will.
Washington immediately denied this, saying Aristide had agreed to step down and leave his country. "It's complete nonsense," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters.
"We took steps to protect Mr. Aristide, we took steps to protect his family and they departed Haiti. It was Mr Aristide's decision to resign," he said.
U.S. officials said that after intensive consultation between U.S. officials and Aristide on Saturday, he had signed a letter of resignation.
Rep. Charles Rangel (news, bio, voting record) and Randall Robinson, the former head of the black lobbying group TransAfrica, said in separate interviews with CNN that Aristide called them from the Central African Republic, where he is in temporary exile.
Robinson, speaking from the Caribbean island of St Kitts, said Aristide had telephoned him on a cell phone on Monday morning from a room in the Central African Republic, where he said he was being guarded by African and French soldiers.
"The president said to me that he had been abducted from his home by about 20 American soldiers in full battle gear with automatic weapons and put on a plane" on Sunday morning, Robertson said.
"Across the aisle from him and Mrs. Aristide sat the American soldier who apparently was the commander of the contingent. They were not told where they were going, nor were they allowed to make any phone calls before they left the house or on the plane," he said.
He said Aristide had told him the plane made two stops before landing in the Central African Republic and that the Americans had instructed them not to raise the blinds to look out when the plane was on the ground.
"Not until they arrived did the president learn where he was," Robertson said. "He said to me twice before he had to get off the phone, 'Tell the world that it's a coup. That American soldiers abducted (me)."'
Rangel, a Democratic member of the House (of Representatives) from New York, said he heard a similar account from Aristide by telephone. Aristide told him he was "disappointed that the international community had let him down, that he was kidnapped, that he resigned under pressure."
Maxine Waters, a Democrat from California and like Rangel a member of the congressional black caucus, also said she had heard by telephone from Aristide that he had been kidnapped, a spokeswoman for Waters said.