Little girls raped, children recruited by gangs, houses burned… The boss of UNICEF described Thursday the “horrors” suffered by the people of Haiti, calling on the world not to forget this country ravaged by the violence of the gangs.
“Haiti is truly becoming a forgotten crisis,” denounced Catherine Russell, a few days after her return from Port-au-Prince, recalling that nearly half of the country’s population, or 5.2 million people, needs assistance. humanitarian aid, including nearly 3 million children. “Violent armed groups control more than 60 percent of the capital and large parts of the country’s agricultural zone,” she added.
“The Haitians and our team there told me that the situation has never been worse than today. Unprecedented hunger and malnutrition, paralyzed economy, resurgence of cholera, and massive insecurity that is creating a spiral of violence, while floods and earthquakes remind us of Haiti’s vulnerability to climate change and natural disasters,” he said. she describes, before reporting testimonies of victims of gangs who use rape as a “weapon of intimidation and control”.
“An 11-year-old girl told me in the sweetest voice that five men grabbed her in the street. Three raped her. She was eight months pregnant when we spoke and gave birth a few days later. »
“A woman told me that armed men broke into her home and raped her. Her 20-year-old sister resisted so much that they killed her by burning her alive. Then they burned down the house,” she added.
“Women and children are dying, schools and public places that should be places of refuge are no longer. The world, collectively, is abandoning the Haitian people and if we don’t take immediate action, it is difficult to imagine a decent future for this population,” she lamented, as the call from the Haitian government relayed by the UN to send an international intervention force to help the police has so far gone unanswered.
“As an international community, we cannot watch this country completely collapse. »
But “in the midst of the horrors, there is some hope,” she noted. “I met teachers and health workers who brave the dangers of the streets to work with children, every day. »