Jacqueline Charles
Sun, October 1, 2023
Nearly a year after Haiti’s caretaker government requested the immediate deployment of an outside armed force to help the country’s ill-equipped and outgunned police take on deadly gangs, the United Nations Security Council is preparing to authorize on Monday sending a multinational force into the troubled Caribbean nation.
A draft resolution, authored by the United States and obtained by the Miami Herald, says the deployment would be reviewed nine months after the adoption of the resolution, and the cost of the temporary operation would be borne through voluntary contributions by U.N. member countries.
The resolution is scheduled for a vote by the 15-member U.N. Security Council at 4 p.m. Monday.
Two possible obstacles to approval: China and Russia. They’re among the five permanent members of the council, along with the U.S., the United Kingdom and France, any of which have veto power over any resolution.
The two countries have expressed concerns about the draft, which was co-authored by Ecuador with input from Kenya, the East African nation that has volunteered to lead the intervention but requested a Security Council resolution before moving ahead.
China and Russia’s concerns include questions about the size of the Multinational Security Support mission, as it is being officially called, and details on its rules of engagement. The draft doesn’t mention the size of the force. It authorizes the mission to “adopt urgent temporary measures on an exceptional basis” to prevent the loss of life and help the Haiti police maintain basic law and order and public safety, as necessary.
The draft resolution also says the rules of engagement — the directives on how and when to use force — are to be developed in consultation with Haiti, the leadership of the mission and the countries contributing to the force. The wording says the Security Council would be informed about the rules of engagement, mission goals and an end date before the mission’s full deployment.
Similar questions raised by China and Russia were asked last month of U.S. officials after a meeting on Haiti’s security was held on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly to seek support for both the resolution and the deployment. Victoria Nuland, the acting U.S. deputy secretary of state, said at the time that such questions “are generally fleshed out after a Security Council resolution. There is no precedent for that level of detail in a resolution itself.”
Another issue, particularly for China, is the illicit trafficking of arms and ammunition in Haiti. Despite a U.S. arms embargo on Haiti, gangs are not only well-armed but they have access to high-powered long-range rifles that can penetrate walls. The weapons have been used to carry out deadly massacres and empty out entire neighborhoods in Port-au-Prince, the capital, and regional provinces.
National Police patrol during an anti-gang operation in the Tabare neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Tuesday, July 25, 2023.
The resolution affirms that the arms embargo “is one of the three pillars” of a sanctions protocol the council adopted last October and it “strongly urges Member States to without delay prohibit the supply, sale, or transfer of small arms, light weapons, and ammunition to non-State actors engaged in or supporting gang violence, criminal activities, or human rights abuses in Haiti, as well as to take all appropriate steps to prevent their illicit trafficking and diversion.”
Two diplomatic sources said there were high hopes that the resolution would pass when the draft first circulated among U.N. members on Friday. But that night, China sent out a note with edits. A U.S. diplomatic source said China’s request for changes to the resolution’s arms embargo language was adopted in a deal with Washington on Saturday, although negotiations with China continued Sunday.
Critics of the U.S. policy on Haiti have called for more to be done to stop the trafficking of weapons into Haiti, most of which leave ports in Florida, though some also make their way into the country via its porous 220-mile border with the neighboring Dominican Republic.
Since Haiti appealed for international intervention a year ago on Oct. 6, the security situation has only gotten worse, with close to 2,800 killings, nearly 1,500 reported kidnappings for ransom and tens of thousands of Haitians forced out of their homes due to the expanding gang attacks. A recent report by the Center for Analysis and and Research in Human Rights in Port-au-Prince documented at least 45 makeshift camps camps in the metropolitan Port-au-Prince area, more than half of them at schools, where an estimated 30,000 to 35,000 people are currently seeking refuge after being forced out of their homes in the past two months.
Gédéon Jean, who runs the human rights group, said “it is extremely important” that the Security Council approve the resolution.
“The United Nations has an obligation to protect a population that is in danger,” he said. “With what is unfolding in Haiti at this moment, only a multinational force can accompany the police and help them.
“It’s a catastrophe, what we are living here today where the gangs are not only killing people, raping them and burning homes, they are burning police stations and taking their vehicles.”
Jean said that given the critical situation Haitians are living on a daily basis, he hopes that China and Russia either vote for the deployment or abstain from voting.
The United Nations Security Council.
Washington has said several countries are willing to deploy police or military to Haiti and are just waiting on the blessing of the Security Council. The U.S. has so far declined to name the countries besides The Bahamas, Jamaica and Antigua and Barbuda, which had previously announced their intent to take part in the mission. The Miami Herald has learned the others are Italy, Spain, Mongolia, Senegal, Belize, Suriname, Guatemala and Peru.
In an interview with the BBC, Kenya Foreign Minister Alfred Mutua said if the resolution is adopted, his country will have boots on the ground in Haiti by the first of January, “if not before.”
He said his country, which announced in late July that it was “positively considering” leading the force and deploying 1,000 of its officers to take part, initially thought it would be leading a so-called “static” mission — in which its forces would provide protection to key government installations such as the airport and seaports, but not engage directly with the gangs.
But a Kenyan assessment team that visited Haiti in August heard concerns from the police and Prime Minister Ariel Henry that just protecting key infrastructure would not be enough. Haitians also reacted strongly against the idea after the Herald published a story about Kenya’s proposed static mission.
“This is going to be an intervention force,” Mutua said. “This is a force that will need to go and disarm the thugs and the gangs. This is the one that we’ll need to go and free kidnapped people and free the women being raped.”
The Multinational Security Support mission, according to the resolution, will provide operational support to the Haitian national police, “including building its capacity through the planning and conduct of joint security support operations, as it works to counter gangs and improve security conditions in Haiti.”
The force would also help secure “critical infrastructure sites and transit locations such as the airport, ports, and key intersections.”
The force would also assist the Haiti National Police to provide “unhindered and safe access to humanitarian aid for the population receiving assistance.”
The resolution urges Haitian gangs and their supporters to cease their criminal acts, and condemns in the “strongest terms the increasing violence, criminal activities, and human rights abuses and violations which undermine the peace, stability, and security of Haiti and the region.”
The resolution also strongly condemns and expresses “deep concern over the gravity and numbers of violations and abuses committed against children in Haiti,” and notes gangs’ abuse against them, “including those involving killing and maiming, recruitment and use, rape and other forms of sexual and gender-based violence, particularly against girls, attacks on schools and hospitals, abduction, and denial of humanitarian access.”
U.N. member countries are also asked to deploy people with expertise in anti-gang operations, community-oriented policing, and the protection of women and children. Before any forces are deployed they would be to undergo training on human rights, child protection, and sexual and gender-based violence.
The last a foreign intervention force was sent into Haiti was in 2004. The U.N. stabilization peacekeeping mission lasted until 2017. Despite its success with taking on gangs, the mission was scarred by allegations of sexual abuse involving peacekeepers and the introduction of waterborne cholera by forces from Nepal.
The resolution includes language on wastewater treatment and to curb sexual abuse. It tells member countries participating in the security mission “take necessary action to ensure appropriate conduct and discipline and to prevent sexual exploitation and abuse, including vetting of all personnel.” The resolution also calls for timely investigations of all allegations of misconduct, to hold perpetrators accountable, and to repatriate units when there is credible evidence of misconduct.
While the resolution welcomes Kenya’s willingness to lead the mission, critics have raised questions about the East African nation’s ability to do so and its forces’ record on human-rights abuses. There are also cultural and language differences to overcome — Kenyans speak English and the official languages of Haiti are French and Haitian-Creole.
Another complicating factor: Haiti’s difficult, and sometimes labyrinthine terrain. Many of the gangs and their leaders live in maze-like slums where concrete shacks are separated by very narrow corridors.
In 2021, an ill-fated operation by specialized Haitian police officers in one particularly notorious slum resulted in the deaths of several police officers during an ambush. Their bodies were never recovered.
Mutua, the Kenyan foreign minister, said that Kenya doesn’t “think there’s going to be a lot of violence,” and believes the gangs will retreat once forces arrive because up until now, they haven’t had “anybody who can match them.”
He acknowledged, however, that the gangs know the terrain better than the Kenyan forces will. But the Kenyan forces, he insisted, will be prepared to take them on.
The gangs “don’t have the support of the people,” he said. “For the last few months, nearly 300 gang members have had their heads chopped off by members of the public. There is an uprising currently going on in Haiti. People are saying enough is enough”
Mutua said a recent poll shows 80% of Haitians “want Kenya to come and lead the force.” The Kenya assessment team conducted the poll to make sure its presence in Haiti would be welcome.
“People are tired. They just need a team to be on the ground,” he said.
“People are right to be skeptical because other emissions have failed before,” Mutua added. “But those are U.N. peacekeeping missions. This is a different mission. This is a mission that is going to go there with the mandate of making sure that the gangs are repelled, and that there’s a sense of peace, security and control in Haiti.”
McClatchy Senior White House and National Security Correspondent Michael Wilner contributed to this report.
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