Haiti | Washington discusses UN peacekeeping operation

(San Juan) The United States is now considering a U.N.-led peacekeeping operation in Haiti as one way to secure funding and personnel for the mission currently led by Kenya, a senior U.S. diplomat said Wednesday.

Brian A. Nichols, the U.S. assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs, spoke hours after the Miami Herald wrote that President Joe Biden’s administration is considering the possibility of a traditional U.N. peacekeeping operation, given the limited funding and equipment the current mission has to quell gang violence.

Mr. Nichols said a UN peacekeeping operation is one of several options being considered.

The U.N. Security Council would first have to vote on a peacekeeping mission. But experts say the council is unlikely to support such a resolution. They also say many Haitians would likely balk at it, given the introduction of cholera cases and sexual assaults during the last U.N. troop presence in Haiti.

Mr. Nichols stressed Wednesday that the current U.N.-backed mission in Haiti relies on voluntary contributions — with the United States and Canada providing the bulk of its funding so far.

About 400 Kenyan police officers are currently deployed in Haiti, but the mission also plans to deploy police and troops from the Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Benin, Chad and Jamaica, for a total of 2,500 personnel, deployed in phases. This deployment would cost about $600 million per year; currently, the UN has pledged $85 million, of which $68 million has been received so far.

Contributions to the UN fund for the mission have been limited, however, and Haitians complain that they have seen no real reduction in gang violence since the first Kenyan contingent arrived in late June.

“The rest of the international community must step up with much larger financial contributions to ensure that the force [de maintien de la paix] can continue to operate and other countries deploy their units there,” Mr. Nichols said.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is scheduled to travel to Haiti on Thursday and to the neighboring Dominican Republic later. He is expected to meet with Haiti’s new prime minister, Garry Conille, and members of the transitional presidential council, and push for the appointment of a provisional electoral council so Haiti can hold long-awaited elections.

“The Prime Minister is rightly concerned about the future, but I think we have come a long way since the beginning of the year,” Mr Nichols said on Wednesday.

Political vacuum and armed violence

Haiti last held presidential elections in November 2016, but gang violence and political upheaval have prevented any elections since.

Former President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in July 2021, and violence has escalated in the political vacuum that followed. Last February, gangs launched coordinated attacks targeting key government infrastructure to prevent the return of former Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was in Kenya to discuss the upcoming mission.

The gangs attacked more than two dozen police stations, opened fire on the main international airport, forcing it to close for nearly three months, and stormed Haiti’s two largest prisons, freeing thousands of inmates.

Mr. Henry, unable to return to Haiti, resigned in April. A transitional presidential council was subsequently created and named Mr. Conille prime minister.

“We have come a long way since those very dark times,” Nichols said, noting that Haitian police and military recently launched their first joint operation with the Kenyans, “to go after gangs and their leaders in a way that hasn’t happened in years.”

But gangs still control 80 percent of the capital Port-au-Prince, and their leaders continue to order attacks in surrounding areas. From January to May, more than 3,200 people were killed, and the violence has left more than half a million people homeless in recent years.

Efforts to make political progress have also stalled, and Haiti’s transitional council now finds itself embroiled in a high-profile corruption scandal.

Three of its nine members were accused of demanding more than US$750,000 from the head of the government-owned National Credit Bank if he wanted to keep his job. The director has since resigned and the three board members have denied the charges, while the government investigates.

“The Haitian people deserve transparency and good governance, and the international community, which provides good assistance, must see this as well,” Nichols said.