As chaos worsens in Haiti, long-promised Canadian-funded police mission remains stalled

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As escalating gang violence pushes Haiti closer to civil war or even collapse, the beleaguered country is still awaiting the arrival of a long-promised Kenyan-led multinational police force that Canada is helping to finance.

Roaming gangs are pillaging banks and offices across Haiti, thousands of prisoners have escaped from jails, flights have been suspended and the country’s airport has fallen under attack by armed men. A state of emergency has been declared, and at least 15,000 people have fled their homes. Gangs control an estimated 80 per cent of the capital, Port-au-Prince.

Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who visited Kenya last week to sign an agreement on the multinational security force, was unable to return to the country this week. After days of confusion, he landed in Puerto Rico instead. The United States is pushing him to resign, according to a Miami Herald story on Wednesday, although the White House denied the report.

A coalition of gangs, led by former police officer Jimmy (Barbecue) Chérizier, attacked police stations and prisons on the weekend, and tried to seize the airport to prevent Mr. Henry from returning to the country. The Prime Minister has been in power without any elections since the 2021 assassination of former president Jovenel Moïse, and many Haitians consider his rule to be illegitimate and have called for him to step down. Mr. Henry was expected to hold elections and resign by Feb. 7, but he failed to do so.

Ottawa announced last month that it will provide $80.5-million to help finance the Kenyan-led multinational mission, which is to include 1,000 Kenyan police officers and thousands of security forces from several other countries, including 2,000 troops from Benin.

The multinational force has been planned since last year, and Mr. Henry signed an agreement with Kenyan President William Ruto on Friday in Nairobi to pave the way for the deployment. Mr. Ruto promised to proceed with “fast-tracking” the Kenyan police contribution, although he did not specify any timing.

But this week, as the Haiti crisis grows more horrific and the need for security becomes more desperate, there has been no sign of the deployment.

The reasons for the latest delay are unclear. The police mission had earlier been stalled for months by legal challenges and political opposition in Kenya. There are also funding issues in the U.S. and elsewhere. The Kenyan government has said it will not deploy its officers until the funding is in hand.

The Haiti security mission will reportedly cost up to US$600-million over the next two years, with a total of about 5,000 personnel on the ground. Since it is not a United Nations peacekeeping mission, it will need to be financed by individual countries.

The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has pledged US$200-million to help pay for the multinational force, but Republican lawmakers in Congress have blocked approval of the first US$50-million of this amount.

“We’re going to need some support, and we are working actively with members of Congress,” John Kirby, the White House security spokesperson, told reporters on Tuesday.

The administration is working with Kenya and other countries to get the mission up and running “as soon as possible,” he said, in order “to help create the conditions where the people of Haiti can live free and in security, so that humanitarian assistance can get there more freely and get to the people that need it.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres is troubled by the rapidly deteriorating situation in Haiti and is calling for “urgent action, particularly in providing financial support for the Multinational Security Support mission” in order to prevent the country from “plunging into further chaos,” said Stéphane Dujarric, his spokesperson, at a briefing this week.

“As each day goes by, if not each hour, it is clear that the Haitian people are the ones who are suffering … in the midst of horrific and inhumane violence,” Mr. Dujarric said.

He called for a “faster and more sustained support and a coalescence of support of the international community around the multinational support mission,” as such an action tends to “get on the ground much faster than an official UN peacekeeping mission.”

The UN Security Council, at a closed session on Wednesday, expressed alarm at the worsening Haiti situation.

Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly spoke to her Jamaican counterpart, Kamina Smith, this week to discuss the Haiti crisis.

“We are working with international partners to ensure Haitian security actors have the necessary resources to stabilise the situation until the Multinational Security Support Mission arrives,” said Geneviève Tremblay, a Global Affairs Canada spokesperson, in response to questions from The Globe and Mail.

In Kenya, however, there is strong opposition to the plans. Activists went to court and obtained a ruling in January that declared the Kenyan police deployment to Haiti to be illegal because it lacked proper authorization.

Kenya’s government said it could bypass the court ruling by signing an agreement with Haiti to authorize the mission, which it did last week. But many politicians are still bitterly fighting the plan.

“What magic is Kenya going to do in Haiti when we cannot deal with cattle thieves in Northern Kenya?” asked Ekuru Aukot, a lawyer and opposition politician who helped challenge the deployment in the Kenyan courts, in a social-media post this week.

Another politician, Miguna Miguna, said in a social-media post: “If the Haitian Prime Minister cannot even return safely to Haiti after his visit to Kenya, it would be an act of criminal recklessness for the Government of Kenya to send 1,000 Kenyan policemen to Haiti to be slaughtered.”