SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – The United States is considering a U.N. peacekeeping mission in Haiti as one way to secure funding and personnel for a Kenyan-led mission sent to quell gang violence in the Caribbean nation, a top U.S. diplomat said Wednesday.
Brian A. Nichols, the US assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, spoke hours after The Miami Herald reported that US President Joe Biden’s administration is considering a traditional UN peacekeeping mission due to the current mission’s limited funding and equipment.
“A peacekeeping operation is one of the ways we can achieve that,” Nichols told reporters. “But we’re looking at a number of ways.”
The UN Security Council should ultimately vote on the peacekeeping operation. However, experts have said it is unlikely to support one, noting that many Haitians would reject it given the cholera and sexual abuse incidents that occurred when UN troops were last in Haiti.
When asked about a possible peacekeeping operation, the UN spokesman said only that “It would be a decision of the Security Council.”
Nichols noted that the current UN-backed mission in Haiti depends on voluntary donations, with the United States and Canada providing most of the funding so far.
About 400 Kenyan police are currently in Haiti, but the operation also requires police and soldiers from the Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Benin, Chad and Jamaica for a total of 2,500 personnel. They would be introduced in phases that would cost about $600 million a year. Currently, the UN has pledged $85 million for the mission, of which $68 million has been received.
However, payments to the UN fund for the operation have been limited, and Haitians complain that they have seen no reduction in gang violence since the Kenyans first arrived in late June.
“We need the rest of the international community to step forward with a much more significant financial contribution so that the force can continue to operate and other countries can send their units as part of (the mission),” Nichols said.
He spoke a day before US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits Haiti on Thursday and then the neighboring Dominican Republic.
Blinken is expected to meet with Haitian Prime Minister Garry Conille and the Interim Presidential Council and call for the appointment of an Interim Electoral Council to allow Haiti to hold long-awaited elections.
“The prime minister is rightfully concerned about the future, but I think we’ve come a pretty long way since the beginning of the year,” Nichols said.
Haiti’s last presidential election was held in November 2016, with gang violence and political upheaval blocking the election since then.
Former President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in July 2021, and gang violence increased in the political vacuum that followed. In February, the gangs launched coordinated attacks on key government infrastructure to prevent the return of former prime minister Ariel Henry, who was in Kenya to talk about his upcoming mission.
The groups raided more than two dozen police stations, opened fire on the main international airport and forced it to close for nearly three months, and stormed Haiti’s two largest prisons, freeing thousands of inmates.
Henry, unable to return to Haiti, resigned in April. Later, a provisional presidential council was established, which appointed Conille as prime minister.
“We’ve come a long way since those very dark times,” Nichols said, noting that the Haitian police and military recently launched their first joint operation with the Kenyans, “going after the troops and their leaders in a way that hasn’t happened in years.”
But the gangs still control 80 percent of the capital, Port-au-Prince, and their leaders continue to order attacks in surrounding areas. Between January and May, more than 3,200 people died, and the violence has left more than half a million people homeless in recent years.
Efforts to make political progress have also stalled, with Haiti’s Transitional Council now embroiled in a high-profile corruption scandal. Three of its nine members have been accused of demanding more than $750,000 from the head of the state-owned National Bank of Credit to secure their jobs. The director has since resigned and three council members have denied the allegations, which are being investigated by the board.
“The Haitian people deserve transparency and good governance, and the international community, which is providing good assistance, needs to see that as well,” Nichols said.
After visiting Haiti, Blinken is expected to meet with Dominican President Luis Abinader, who has banned Haitians from flying into the country and is building a fence along the border the two nations share on the island of Hispaniola.
Nichols said the United States hopes to see more normal relations between the two countries, “but obviously those are sovereign decisions.”
