UN chief calls on world to make troubled Haiti ‘top priority’
- Antonio Guterres urges the UN Security Council to deploy a robust security force to help Haiti tackle violence, a worsening public health situation and political instability
- Armed gangs controlling more than 60 per cent of the capital and large swathes of the countryside, with almost half of Haiti’s population needing humanitarian help
On a visit to spotlight violence and chaos in Haiti, the UN secretary-general on Saturday called for a robust international effort to help the country’s beleaguered police in fighting rampant criminal gangs.
For months, Antonio Guterres has raised the alarm bell about the situation in the Western hemisphere’s poorest country, which has been wracked by spiralling violence, a worsening public health situation and political instability.
“We must put Haiti on the international political map, and make the tragedy of the Haitian people the international community’s top priority,” Guterres said.
“I met Haitians, and I felt the exhaustion of a population that has been facing a cascade of crises and unbearable living conditions for too long,” he said.
“This is not the time to forget about Haiti,” Guterres said after meeting Prime Minister Ariel Henry, and other political and civil society leaders.
Guterres urged the UN Security Council, which is due to discuss the Haiti situation later this month, “to authorise the immediate deployment of a robust international security force”.