An estimated one million people were left homeless two weeks ago by the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that struck Haiti, the worst natural disaster on record anywhere in the Americas.

There has already been an exodus of more than 235,000 people, roughly one in 10, from the decimated capital. Port-au-Prince had accounted for some 60 percent of the country's wealth prior to the January 12 quake.

"I'm not going to Croix des Bouquets or anywhere for that matter," said Martine Desir, 24, referring to a new temporary community being set up by the government some 15 kilometers (nine miles) outside the capital.

Desir lives with her family, nine in all, in the Champ de Mars. The landmark gardens in front of Haiti's presidential palace have been transformed since the quake into a dreadful slum.

Survivors have turned every bit of green space available, from public parks to elite golf courses, into squalid tent cities as they subside in cramped and humiliating conditions.

Others sleep by the rubble where their houses once stood in a bid to protect their meager belongings from looters desperate for anything they can find to sell for food or water.

The Champ de Mars is one of the first places the government wants to clear to places like Croix des Bouquets, which it is styling as a mini-village initially intended to house up to 20,000 survivors.

Haitian Health Minister Alex Larsen, warning of the high risk of disease spreading in the unsanitary conditions faced in the camps, has urged survivors to relocate.

His government says 400,000 tents are already available for the mass relocation project, which it hopes will eventually accommodate all those left homeless by the quake.

While survivors yearn for less squalor and more security, many in this desperately poor Caribbean nation are driven by a brutal economic logic that dictates they must find work to survive.

"Tomorrow, I will start to work," said Desir, an employee of a local telephone company. "I can't go so far away, impossible," she said, shaking her head.

A glimmer of hope finally came her way when the company sent her a text message: "Please contact Betty or Yasmine to confirm whether you are available by Wednesday."

Desir's work, earning her about 100 gourdes (three dollars) per hour, can mean the difference here between misery and a decent life for her family.

Israel Jean-Claude has walked countless times back and forth from Champ de Mars to the ruins of his home to pull out clothes for his family.

"Go to Croix des Bouquets? That's no problem if there's security," said the 62-year-old whose main concern is the safety of his three teenage daughters, and making sure they can finish school this year.

The Jean-Claude family received its first aid supply, a bag of rice, from the US military on Tuesday, two weeks after the disaster struck.

"We have nothing now. Only our clothes, that's it. I don't want a tent, I want a roof," Jean-Claude said.

Neither he nor his eldest son had heard about programs paying survivors to clear debris from the roadways.

Work in Haiti was hard to come by even before the quake, when there was 70 percent unemployment nationwide and 80 percent of Haitians lived below the poverty line on less than two dollars a day.

Manasse Osny, 33, and his mother sleep under a canopy in the poor neighborhood of Delmas. The house they rented was destroyed, and neither one of them has enough money to pay even for the barest of essentials.

"We are 39 families living on the street," Osny said. At night, they huddle together to sleep, a scene repeated in hundreds of other streets across the capital.

"I don't know if I'll go to Croix des Bouquets. The government will say," the young man said casually.

One of the new government relocation sites could be located in a field close to the US embassy.

"Near the US embassy, you say?" one of Manasse's neighbors said, her eyes lighting up for a brief moment.

Clinton positive on forgiving Haiti debt
Washington (AFP) Jan 26, 2010 - US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton voiced support Tuesday for forgiving Haiti's debt, doubting the earthquake-battered nation would be able to repay it.

"It's just unrealistic to think that Haiti would ever, in the far foreseeable future, be able to repay," Clinton said in an interview with American Urban Radio Networks broadcast Tuesday.

Clinton said the United States was looking at plans outlined by international lenders to forgive Haiti's debt which stood at around one billion dollars before the earthquake.

Three lenders -- the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank -- made presentations on debt relief Tuesday at an emergency conference on Haiti in Montreal.

"Absolutely, it's feasible. We are looking at that," Clinton told the radio network, which is geared toward an African American audience.

The IMF and World Bank last year forgave 1.2 billion dollars in debt owed by the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation, which was already suffering from floods and high food prices.

After the earthquake, the World Bank gave Haiti a five-year grace period on debt payments and the Paris Club, which groups rich countries, recommended canceling the 214 million dollars owed by Haiti to its members.

Haiti's top lender was Venezuela, not a member of the Paris Club, but leftist President Hugo Chavez on Monday announced he was forgiving the nation's 295 million dollar debt to Caracas.

US Representative Maxine Waters has appealed with the Congressional Black Caucus for the United States to use its influence with international lenders to forgive Haiti's remaining debt.

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