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By SEN. MIKE DEWINE

Cushioned amid the white-sand, palm-fringed beaches and warm, sapphire-hued waters of the Caribbean lies the island nation of Haiti -- once a lush, tropical sanctuary, now a paradise lost. Wracked by near constant struggle and strife, Haiti is a nation wrought with government mismanagement and corruption, violence, poverty and disease. It is a nation on the brink of collapse.

This is a critical time for Haiti. It is also a critical time for the United States. Unless the Haitian government initiates significant political and economic changes, we once again will see boats swollen with Haitians risking their lives to get to Miami and the chance for a better life.

Internally, Haiti is a tinderbox of violence waiting to ignite. The Organization of American States continues to struggle to devise a strategy to halt Haiti's downward spiral, despite the recent establishment of a new permanent OAS mission in Haiti to help resolve the continuing electoral stalemate.

I returned from my ninth trip to Haiti in January, where I again witnessed devastation, destitution and desperation. Today, less than one-half of Haiti's 8.2 million people can read or write. The country's infant mortality rate is the highest in our hemisphere. At least 23 percent of children ages zero to 5 are malnourished, and only 39 percent of Haitians have access to clean water. Diseases like measles, malaria and tuberculosis are epidemic.

Roughly one out of every 12 Haitians has HIV/AIDS. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention projections, Haiti will experience up to 44,000 new HIV/AIDS cases this year -- that's at least 4,000 more than the number expected here in the United States, a nation with a population nearly 35 times larger. Already, AIDS has orphaned 163,000 children, a number expected to skyrocket to between 323,000 and 393,000 over the next 10 years.

Haiti's economy is in shambles. It grows worse by the day. Haiti remains the poorest nation in our hemisphere, with 70 percent of the people either under-employed or unemployed. With such woeful economic conditions, coupled with hollow, ineffective and often corrupt law-enforcement institutions, drug traffickers operate with impunity. As a result, 15 percent of all cocaine entering the United States passes through Haiti, the Dominican Republic or both.

Democracy and political stability continue to elude Haiti even now, over seven years after we sent more than 20,000 U.S. troops to oversee the end of military rule and the restoration of a constitutional government, with Jean-Bertrand Aristide as president. Though no one expected miracles or immediate recovery when Aristide first returned to power in 1994, we did expect his government to establish a foundation for change and progress that would help move the country away from its failed past toward a hopeful and productive future.

Regrettably, President Aristide and his predecessor, René Préval, have and are shirking the hard work of democracy-building -- the labor and sweat necessary to build and stabilize a nation.

Today, violence remains rampant. Journalists and opposition members fear for their lives and the safety of their families. Guyler Delva, head of Haiti's leading journalist group, believes that he has been targeted with death threats that are part of a wider government-tolerated campaign to intimidate reporters. The Dec. 17 coup attempt and the pro-Aristide mob violence that followed further typify the lawlessness and tumult that continue to plague Haiti absent a solid democratic framework and system of justice.

In a recent meeting with President Aristide, I raised these concerns. I argued that now, more than ever, it is essential that he call for peace and push for domestic order. Continued violence and retribution only will perpetuate instability and upheaval. Aristide has an obligation to use his immense popularity to make it unequivocally clear to his supporters that taking revenge on people who were involved in the attempted coup or taking revenge on parties that oppose him is not in the best interests of the nation.

He needs to say: Stop the violence.

Furthermore, Aristide should lay a bold plan upon the table to end the political impasse -- a proposal that the opposition parties cannot refuse.

In the spirit of the Inter-American Democratic Charter -- a new tool created on the heels of the Sept. 11 attacks -- Aristide needs to work with the OAS to allow an independent investigation into allegations of violence and corruption, mediate a truce between the government and the opposition and strengthen government institutions to allow democracy to flourish.

To borrow the words of Haiti's ambassador to the OAS, Aristide's government needs to build bridges rather than walls.

But that is just the start. Ending the current political stalemate and resolving questions surrounding the recent attempted coup alone will not create a viable democracy in Haiti. In the long-term, Haiti can succeed if -- and only if -- the government takes responsibility for the situation and resolves to end violence, eliminate corruption, create free markets, allow for the privatization of industries, improve the judicial system, respect human rights and develop a sustainable system of agriculture.

In the meantime, the United States also must take responsibility by continuing and sizeably increasing our humanitarian efforts in Haiti. We have a moral obligation to stay committed to the people -- irrespective of what the Haitian government does or does not do.

Already, we have cut too much of the aid that goes to the non-governmental organizations dedicated to feeding starving Haitian children; teaching the men and women better, more-effective methods of farming; and instituting much-needed health care programs. Last year, we provided $77 million in humanitarian aid. This year, that figure has dropped to $55 million. This is simply not acceptable.

We are at a crossroads. Aristide and the political rulers have a simple choice -- break with history and create a stable political system and a free, democratic market economy; or perpetuate the needless, bloody tragedy that confines future generations of Haitians to lives of disillusionment and despair.

The choice is theirs -- the consequences belong to us all.

Mike DeWine, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Ohio.