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PORT-AU-PRINCE-A man was killed by gunfire as demonstrators took to the streets in the southern Haitian city of Les Cayes on Monday, raising the death toll to five in protests against rising food prices, officials and radio reports said.Rock-throwing student protesters also clashed with police outside the state-run national university in Port-au-Prince, capital of the impoverished Caribbean nation of nearly 9 million people, expressing anger at the higher cost of food.Four people were killed and 20 others were hurt in a riot in Les Cayes last week. U.N. vehicles were burned, peacekeepers were attacked and a food warehouse was looted by angry mobs on Thursday and Friday.In response to the unrest, Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis announced a multimillion-dollar investment program aimed at lowering the cost of living.Prices of rice and other essentials have doubled and in some cases tripled, sparking protests since Wednesday in Gonaives, Petit-Goave and other cities against the government of President Rene Preval, whose 2006 election brought relative calm after decades of violence and political upheaval.The head of the United Nations World Food Program warned on Monday that a global surge in food prices could lead to further tensions. Unrest related to food and fuel costs has recently hit Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Mozambique and Senegal, it said."A new face of hunger is emerging; even where food is available on the shelves, there are now more and more people who simply cannot afford it," WFP director Josette Sheeran said in a statement.To read more go to:
As in the days of Noah....
