KENYAN President William Ruto has landed in the Haitian capital to assess a Kenya-led security mission in the Caribbean nation, a day after a United Nations expert warned that Haiti faced deepening violence and insecurity.
In a statement on Saturday, a spokesperson for Ruto said the Kenyan leader would “visit and commend the Kenyan contingent working alongside their Haitian counterparts”.
Ruto also planned to meet with Haiti’s transitional presidential council and other officials, Hussein Mohamed said in a social media post.
The visit to Port-au-Prince comes about three months after the first Kenyan officers arrived in Haiti as part of a UN-backed, multinational mission aimed at tackling a surge in gang violence.
Haiti has reeled from years of violence as armed groups – often with ties to the country’s political and business leaders – have vied for influence and control of territory.
An uptick in attacks across Port-au-Prince at the end of February prompted the resignation of Haiti’s unelected prime minister, the creation of the transitional presidential council and the deployment of the Kenyan police deployment.
Yet despite the presence of Kenyan and other foreign police officers in the country, insecurity remains rampant, with armed groups believed to still control about 80 percent of Port-au-Prince.
As of August, more than 578,000 Haitians had been internally displaced, largely due to the violence, according to data (PDF) from the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Displaced families have been forced to live in squalid conditions as they wait to safely return to their homes.
On Friday, William O’Neill, a UN human rights expert on Haiti, said the country faced a dire humanitarian crisis as the armed groups continued to exert influence and carry out attacks.
He said the UN-backed mission – formally known as the Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS) – had so far deployed less than a quarter of its planned force. The mission’s mandate expires early next month.
