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Haitians express scepticism over Kenya’s offer to UN to send police to confront gangs

Published:Friday | August 4, 2023 | 5:07 PM
Riot policemen walk back during clashes with protesters in the Kibera area of Nairobi, Kenya on July 19, 2023. The United States is praising Kenya's interest in leading a multinational force in Haiti. But weeks ago, the US openly warned Kenyan police officers against violent abuses. Now 1,000 of those police officers might head to Haiti to take on gang warfare. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga, File)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI (AP) — Haitians are expressing scepticism over an offer by Kenya to lead an international police force aimed at combatting the gang violence that has wracked the Caribbean nation.

They say the sexual abuse and a devastating cholera outbreak that have accompanied foreign forces in past decades don't inspire much trust.

But Haitians also say uncontrolled bloodshed in their country leaves them with few other options.

Florence Casimir, an elementary school teacher, said that while past international interventions have damaged Haiti, their abuses don't compare to the brutality of gangs, which kidnap her students and force parents to pay hefty ransoms.

“It will never be better (than past interventions), but the Haitian people don't have a choice at this point,” Casimir said.

“The Haitian people can'

Kenya's proposal has sparked debate among Haitians, many of whom distrust international interventions after the failures and abuses of UN peacekeeping missions over the decades.

Haitians saw rounds of foreign interventions throughout the 1900s, often a response by nations like the US to political instability in Haiti.

In some cases, such missions helped ease chaos and in the 1990s led to the creation of the Haitian National Police.

But successes are often overshadowed by scars that Haitians carry with them from abuses that came with those missions.

A UN peacekeeping mission from 2004 to 2017 was plagued with allegations of mass sexual abuse, including claims that peacekeepers raped and impregnated girls as young as 11. 

Investigations by The Associated Press found evidence of high levels of impunity.

In 2010, sewage runoff from a UN peacekeeper camp into the country's biggest river started a cholera epidemic that killed nearly 10,000 people.

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