A 3rd contingent of cops from Kenya arrives at Toussaint Louverture Worldwide Airport in Port-au-Prince on January 18, 2025. Agence France-Presse
PORT-AU-PRINCE — An extra 217 Kenyan cops landed in Haiti on Saturday to bolster a multinational pressure looking for to revive order to the violence-ridden Caribbean island.
Felony gangs nonetheless management some 85 p.c of the capital Port-au-Prince, the United Nations estimates, regardless of the deployment final June of the Kenyan-led Multinational Safety Help Mission (MSS) underneath UN auspices.
The Kenyan forces, who have been greeted on the airport in Port-au-Prince by Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aime, will reinforce the primary batch of 400 officers deployed to Haiti final 12 months.
READ: Worldwide pressure making ‘important progress’ in Haiti – Kenya
“The arrival of those reinforcements marks a vital step in releasing our nation from the grip of prison networks and restoring peace,” the prime minister mentioned.
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A authorities advisor who was additionally on the airport, Fritz Alphonse Jean, mentioned Haiti was “at a turning level.”
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In an announcement earlier Saturday, Kenya’s Inside Minister Kipchumba Murkomen mentioned the Kenyan-led mission in Haiti “has made large progress in decreasing gang violence, incomes reward throughout the globe, together with from each the outgoing and incoming US administrations.”
READ: Trenches, drones: Haiti gangs adapt to struggle Kenya-led police
Gang violence killed not less than 5,601 folks in Haiti final 12 months, a few thousand greater than in 2023, the UN mentioned. Greater than 1,000,000 Haitians have been compelled to flee their houses, 3 times as many as a 12 months in the past.
Kenyan President William Ruto mentioned final September that some 2,500 cops would ultimately be deployed.
The UN Safety Council in September 2024 prolonged the mission’s mandate with out discussing whether or not to put it underneath direct UN management, as requested by many Haitian authorities.
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