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Army Hopes to Quell Violence in Jamaica
Backed by helicopter gunships, soldiers deployed in a troubled Kingston neighborhood Tuesday, patrolling streets blocked with debris from days of gunbattles between police and government opponents that have killed 22 people.
Crouching low with machine gun at the ready, a trooper passed the body of an elderly man sprawled face down in a pool of dried blood, apparently from a bullet in the back. Residents of Tivoli Gardens, the besieged neighborhood, said the man was killed Sunday.
The violence has been concentrated in the capital, Kingston, in southeast Jamaica, though there have been isolated protests and roadblocks that police quickly dismantled in the northern resort towns of Montego Bay and Ocho Rios.
There were no reports of tourists leaving, but a new U.S. travel advisory against western and downtown Kingston raised worries the disturbances could hurt Jamaica's vital $1.3 billion tourism industry.
Prime Minister P.J. Patterson ordered Jamaica's entire army ¡ª more than 3,000 troops ¡ª to deploy Monday night to reinforce security forces trying to put down fighting between gangs affiliated with the two main political parties.
On Tuesday, there was only sporadic fighting after troops moved in.
But the opposition Labor Party says authorities have been targeting only its followers in the crackdown launched Saturday. Since then, at least 22 people have been killed, including three police officers and one soldier. One of the police deaths came Tuesday when an officer was hit in the head by a rock thrown by protesters 40 miles from Montego Bay.
Saturday's police crackdown was launched after more than two months of fighting between gangs in western Kingston that killed 37 people. Police say the gang war was triggered by the killing of a Kingston gang leader.
Seaga has said the fighting is a plot by Patterson's party to embarrass him. Patterson supporters charge Seaga is orchestrating the violence to force an early election while he's ahead in the polls. General elections are due before the end of next year.
Jamaica, with 2.6 million people, has one of the highest murder rates in the world, with 530 this year. That does not include 75 people killed by police between January and last week ¡ª deaths police said were self-defense.
Patterson mounted a similar crackdown two years ago. Jamaica's political history is intertwined with the gangs the two main parties helped organize and arm in Kingston's poor neighborhoods in the 1970s. The gangs control the streets and intimidate voters at election time.
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