Haiti on verge of total collapse, representative tells UN

Haiti’s government is completely unable to counter gang rule, United Nations Haiti chief María Isabel Salvador told the UN Security Council on Monday. Gangs in the last three months overran several areas of the capital city, Port-au-Prince, that were previously untouched—including the city’s downtown and the wealthy Petion-Ville suburb. Gangs also increased violent attacks in other areas of the country, most recently seizing the central Haiti town of Mirebalais and releasing over 500 inmates from its prison, Salvador said.

Additionally, gangs recently increased assaults on the Kenscoff settlement, the only route out of Port-au-Prince that’s not fully under gang control, Salvador said. Armed assailants ambushed and killed three Haitian soldiers on the route and wounded six more on Monday, The Haitian Times reported.

Haiti’s National Police and armed forces were unable to stop the escalating violence, despite support from the Multinational Security Support Mission, Salvador said. The mission is an international security force that includes Kenyan, Jamaican, Belizean, and Bahamian troops, according to the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. Approximately 60,000 Haitians were forcibly displaced in the past two months, adding to one million already displaced by the end of last year, she said.

What did Salvador ask the council to do? Salvador urged UN member states to increase funding to UN agencies in Haiti and especially to the Multinational Security Support Mission. The force was meant to have 2,500 troops in Haiti, but hadn’t reached that goal in February due to funding gaps, The Haitian Times reported.

The United States as of January had flown civilian personnel and non-lethal equipment including vehicles into Haiti 180 times to support the mission, according to the U.S. Southern Command. The flights and equipment are part of the roughly $300 million the United States pledged to the mission, though President Donald Trump temporarily froze more than $13 million as part of a pause on foreign aid, The Haitian Times reported. It’s unclear whether the frozen funds have been restored.

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