(Vienna) Increasingly high caliber weapons are being smuggled in larger quantities into Haiti, with violence reaching levels not seen in decades, according to a UN report seen by AFP on Saturday.
Pistols and even sometimes heavy machine guns “are now being smuggled in”, “in a context of rapid and unprecedented deterioration in security”, wrote the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Haiti has been stuck for years in a deep economic, security and political crisis. The assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in July 2021 has aggravated the situation.
The number of recorded homicides rose from 1,141 in 2019 to 2,183 in 2022 and that of kidnappings from 78 to 1,359, with gangs controlling more than half of the national territory, according to the study which “deplores the effect of trafficking on multiple Haitian crises”.
PHOTO ODELYN JOSEPH, ASSOCIATED PRESS ARCHIVES
Demonstration in Port-au-Prince last January
To draw its conclusions, UNODC relies on a recent increase in firearms seizures, intelligence reports and court decisions.
The UN organization conducted 45 interviews with political leaders, development agencies, experts, members of civil society and also refers to facts reported by the media.
Its assessment should help give “support to the Haitian people,” said in a statement Angela Me, head of the analysis service at UNODC, an office based in Vienna, Austria.
Most of the weapons come from the United States and first transit through Florida where members of the Haitian diaspora “often take care of hiding them in containers of everyday import items”.
Handguns, sold for less than $500 legally in the United States, can be purchased for up to $10,000 in Haiti. Gangs favor AK47 rifles, AR15s and Galil assault rifles.
Porous borders, lack of customs and coast guard resources, which only have one ship in working order, corruption and intimidation are put forward as the main obstacles to a reversal of the trend.
“Investments in community policing, criminal justice reform and the fight against corruption are essential” to restore lasting security, the report concludes.