THE FORCES OF IMPERIALISM
UN chief insists on special armed forces as Haiti spirals
A bullet's impact is seen on an armored police car in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2023. One of Haiti's gangs stormed a key part of the capital, Port-Au-Prince, and battled with police throughout the day, leaving at least three officers dead and another missing.
(AP Photo/Megan Janetsky)
DÁNICA COTO
Mon, January 23, 2023
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — U.N. Secretary General António Guterres on Monday insisted on the deployment of an international specialized armed force to Haiti and called on governments to consider halting deportations as the country’s situation spirals.
The recommendations were issued as part of a report on the U.N. Integrated Office in Haiti, with Guterres noting that gang-related violence and human rights violations have reached a critical level.
“The people of Haiti are suffering the worst human rights and humanitarian emergency in decades,” he wrote.
Guterres noted that while last year’s gang-led siege at a main fuel terminal has ended, a special force is still needed to ensure that key infrastructure remains unobstructed and that people are able to safely vote in a general election whose date has not been set.
The number of reported killings soared by 35% last year compared with the previous year, with more than 2,100 slain. In addition, kidnappings more than doubled last year, with more than 1,350 victims.
Meanwhile, Haiti’s National Police is underfunded and under-resourced, with only some 9,700 active-duty officers in a country of more than 11 million people.
“There are also allegations that a significant number of national police…may be associated with gangs,” Guterres said.
In recent months, countries including Canada and the U.S. have offered training and resources including armored vehicles, but police remain largely outmatched by gangs whose power and territorial control have expanded since President Jovenel Moïse was slain at his private residence in July 2021.
Haiti also is struggling with a deadly cholera outbreak worsened by gang violence and a spike in the number of people who are starving as countries including the U.S. and the Dominican Republic have deported tens of thousands of Haitians in the past year.
The report was released a day before the U.N. Security Council is scheduled to meet and talk about Haiti.
Late last year, the council imposed sanctions on individuals and groups that threatened peace in Haiti, including a powerful gang leader, but it did not vote on the deployment of armed forces as requested by Haiti's top officials in October.
With no democratically elected institutions left in Haiti after the terms of the remaining 10 senators expired on Jan. 9, Prime Minister Ariel Henry has pledged that he is working to hold general elections as soon as possible.
Last week, Henry's administration published a decree with the names of the three members appointed to the High Transition Council, which will be responsible for choosing the provisional electoral council, the first step in preparing for elections. The decree stated that the council also will push economic and human rights reforms, create and execute a public security plan and establish milestones and deadlines for the transition period.
“We will move forward with all those who wish to do so,” Henry said earlier this month.
DÁNICA COTO
Mon, January 23, 2023
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — U.N. Secretary General António Guterres on Monday insisted on the deployment of an international specialized armed force to Haiti and called on governments to consider halting deportations as the country’s situation spirals.
The recommendations were issued as part of a report on the U.N. Integrated Office in Haiti, with Guterres noting that gang-related violence and human rights violations have reached a critical level.
“The people of Haiti are suffering the worst human rights and humanitarian emergency in decades,” he wrote.
Guterres noted that while last year’s gang-led siege at a main fuel terminal has ended, a special force is still needed to ensure that key infrastructure remains unobstructed and that people are able to safely vote in a general election whose date has not been set.
The number of reported killings soared by 35% last year compared with the previous year, with more than 2,100 slain. In addition, kidnappings more than doubled last year, with more than 1,350 victims.
Meanwhile, Haiti’s National Police is underfunded and under-resourced, with only some 9,700 active-duty officers in a country of more than 11 million people.
“There are also allegations that a significant number of national police…may be associated with gangs,” Guterres said.
In recent months, countries including Canada and the U.S. have offered training and resources including armored vehicles, but police remain largely outmatched by gangs whose power and territorial control have expanded since President Jovenel Moïse was slain at his private residence in July 2021.
Haiti also is struggling with a deadly cholera outbreak worsened by gang violence and a spike in the number of people who are starving as countries including the U.S. and the Dominican Republic have deported tens of thousands of Haitians in the past year.
The report was released a day before the U.N. Security Council is scheduled to meet and talk about Haiti.
Late last year, the council imposed sanctions on individuals and groups that threatened peace in Haiti, including a powerful gang leader, but it did not vote on the deployment of armed forces as requested by Haiti's top officials in October.
With no democratically elected institutions left in Haiti after the terms of the remaining 10 senators expired on Jan. 9, Prime Minister Ariel Henry has pledged that he is working to hold general elections as soon as possible.
Last week, Henry's administration published a decree with the names of the three members appointed to the High Transition Council, which will be responsible for choosing the provisional electoral council, the first step in preparing for elections. The decree stated that the council also will push economic and human rights reforms, create and execute a public security plan and establish milestones and deadlines for the transition period.
“We will move forward with all those who wish to do so,” Henry said earlier this month.
TWO HUNDRED YEARS AS U$ COLONY
As Haitian gangs expand control, cop's family is left shaken
A national policeman talks with his colleagues next to an armored police car in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2023. One of Haiti's gangs stormed a key part of the capital, Port-Au-Prince, and battled with police throughout the day, leaving at least three officers dead and another missing.
(AP Photo/Megan Janetsky)
MEGAN JANETSKY
Sat, January 21, 2023
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Every day when Marie Carmel Daniel's husband put on his flak vest and walked out the door for another day of fighting Haiti's gangs, she wondered if he would come home that night.
Friday was the day her smiling spouse of 18 years, Ricken Staniclasse, didn't.
One of the country's nearly 200 gangs ambushed his police unit that morning, sending gunfire echoing through the streets in an unexpected area — a mansion-lined stretch of the country's capital, Port-au-Prince.
A gang led by Lionel Lazarre battled the police patrol under the sweltering Caribbean heat as officers desperately called for backup. But help never came, the country’s police union said.
The fighting killed three officers, hospitalized a fourth with bullet wounds and left the 44-year-old Staniclasse missing.
Daniel, meanwhile, was terrified for herself and their three children.
“My husband was fighting a lot with the gangs, and we don't know what could happen to us," Daniel, 43, said while curled up on her red couch surrounded by neighbors. “I can't sleep at the house anymore because I don't know what could happen to us.”
The firefight was just the latest example of how Haitian gangs have grown in power and expanded in reach, leaving much of the population terrorized.
While the United Nations estimates that 60% of Port-Au-Prince is controlled by the gangs, nowadays most Haitians on the street reckon that number is closer to 100%.
Haiti has struggled with endemic gang violence for years, but the country spiraled into lawlessness after the 2021 killing of former President Jovenel Moïse.
Powerful gangs have taken advantage of the political chaos and discontent with the current government led by Prime Minister Ariel Henry to further consolidate their control.
The government has failed to ease the violence, forcing many to flee their homes. News of rapes, kidnappings and ambushes on police have become the new norm.
Jolicoeur Allande Serge, director of the police unit that was attacked, said the Friday blitz in the Petion-Ville neighborhood was a sign of that. He noted that moving into upper class areas “benefits (the gangs') economic interests.”
Kidnappings and ransoms as high as $1 million have been a key part of the financing for such armed groups.
Meanwhile, police units struggle to keep up.
While Canada and the United States have sent armored vehicles and other supplies to Haiti, law enforcement officials say it is just a fraction of what they really need.
Tensions remained high Saturday, and in the afternoon Serge stood among a pack of armored trucks dented with bullet strikes. Officers holding automatic weapons, their faces covered by black masks, bustled about.
A group of 50 officers was returning to the area where they fought Friday night to try to break a gang blockade and search for the missing officer, Staniclasse.
“I lost three men ... We’re not scared. We’re frustrated because we don’t have enough equipment to fight,” Serge said as he watched a convoy of police trucks roll out from the station. “We need ammo, helmets, armored vehicles.”
Analysts expect the bloodshed to get worse, especially after Haiti’s final 10 elected officers ended their Senate terms in early January, leaving the parliament and presidency unfilled because the government has failed to hold elections.
Critics say that has turned Haiti into a “de-facto dictatorship.”
Meanwhile, people like Marie Carmel Daniel feel hope drain for their country. Daniel said her husband always hoped he could help clean up his city. Together, they built a home and a life together. Their 11-year-old son dreamed of following in his father’s footsteps.
“He loved people, he loved to help people,” she said of her husband.
But two years ago, violence began to get so bad in their neighborhood that they applied for a visa to migrate to the United States, hoping to join an exodus of people leaving Haiti. They never got a reply.
“I don't know if he's alive or dead, but I'm worried," she said. “If we were able to leave the country, my husband would be alive.”
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