HAITI . . . ARISTIDE'S GRIPING, CARTER'S SNIPING

The last-minute swerve away from a Haiti invasion isn't pleasing its chief beneficiary -- Jean-Bertrand Aristide. This morning the exiled Haitian President issued a terse statement that pointedly failed to mention the accord brokered Sunday by former President Jimmy Carter. Instead, he referred only to the 1993 Governors Island agreement that would have ousted the junta members who booted him two years earlier. Capitol Hill held no sympathy: "It's time for Jean-Bertrand Aristide to get real," a U.S. Representative said, voicing a common congressional sentiment. Carter didn't make things any easier for President Clinton. He said he intended to remain in contact with the Haitian rulers "because no one in our State Department . . . will even communicate" with them. Carter also revealed a major motive for undertaking the Haiti mission: "I was ashamed of my country's policy."