Monday November 25, 2024
Haiti, Port-au-Prince
More than 20,000 people have been displaced in four days in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, forced to flee because of the dire humanitarian situation and gang violence, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported on Saturday, November 23.
โSuch a scale of displacement has not been observed since August 2023โ, noted the UN agency in a press release.
The IOM added that around 17,000 of the 20,000 displaced persons were already living in temporary accommodation.
Haiti, already the poorest country in the region, has long suffered from the violence of criminal gangs. These gangs are accused of numerous murders, rapes, looting and kidnappings for ransom.
Last week, the US civil aviation regulator (FAA) banned American airlines from flying into the country, following the shooting down of three planes the previous day. The UN has also suspended its humanitarian flights to Port-au-Prince and redirected them to Cap Haรฏtien airport in the north of the country.
โThe isolation of Port-au-Prince is amplifying an already dire humanitarian situation,โ said Grรฉgoire Goodstein, IOM’s Haiti manager, in a statement
โOur capacity to deliver aid is reaching its limits. Without immediate international support, the suffering will worsen exponentiallyโ, he warned.
Port-au-Prince is facing a new outbreak of violence against the backdrop of a political crisis marked by the dismissal of Prime Minister Garry Conille by the Transitional Presidential Council, and his replacement by businessman Alix Didier Fils-Aimรฉ, who has since been holding consultations to form his ministerial cabinet.
Haitian police announced on Tuesday that they had killed 28 members of armed gangs, with the support of Port-au-Prince residents, after the gangs launched an offensive in the capital. One of Haiti’s main gang leaders, nicknamed โBarbecueโ, escaped a police operation in Port-au-Prince during which two of his lieutenants were killed, police announced on Friday November 22.
The NGO Mรฉdecins Sans Frontiรจres (MSF) had announced that it was suspending its activities in the Haitian capital following โviolence and threats by police forcesโ and after two of its patients were killed.
People walk past the body of a man shot dead by unidentified armed men on the night of March 27 in Port-au-Prince on March 28, 2024. – The situation in chaos-wracked Haiti is “cataclysmic”, with more than 1,500 people killed by gang violence so far this year and more weapons pouring into the country, the UN said on March 28,2024. In a fresh report, the United Nations rights office detailed how “corruption, impunity and poor governance, compounded by increasing levels of gang violence (had) eroded the rule of law and brought state institutions… close to collapse”. (Photo by Clarens SIFFROY / AFP) / NO USE AFTER JANUARY 31, 2025 23:00:00 GMT – AFP PICTURES OF THE YEAR 2024
Sexual violence โwidespreadโ in Haiti, with no access to healthcare (HRW)
Monday, November 25, 2024
Washington, United States
According to the NGO HRW, sexual violence against women is becoming โwidespreadโ in Haiti, and access to healthcare is becoming scarce, against a backdrop of an upsurge in attacks on the population by armed gangs.
Number of children recruited by gangs in Haiti up 70%, warns Unicef
This Monday, November 25, 2024, UNICEF said that the number of children recruited by armed gangs has risen by 70% in Haiti over one year, and they make up almost half of the gang workforce in the Caribbean country.
As gang violence escalates again in Haiti, the United States has called for the multinational security mission to be transformed into a UN force, a divisive request from the country’s authorities for the time being.
Humaniterre with AFP
For AFP By Jean Daniel SENAT and Luckenson JEAN, with Nicolas REVISE in Washington
