The first dependent of an international military security mission, which is regarded as a crucial step in assisting Haiti in battling dangerous criminal gangs, made its first stop at Toussaint Louverture International Airport on Tuesday morning.
Members of the Haiti National Police have much awaited the department’s introduction to help them defeat the armed groups that currently control more than 80 % of the money and parts of the Artibonite area, two hours to the north. The 200 professional Kenyan officials and their support staff were met on the tarmac by members of the Haiti National Police.
National Security Advisor Monica Juma was with the Kenyans, who are assigned to numerous terrorist-fighting elite causes in the West African nation. She later cited the Haitian score as a mark of her country’s” responsibility to help the Haitian federal authorities to restore public order and security, to build bridge between our people and nations” and” to serve as agents of peace, security and desire.”
As the 240- chair Boeing 787 plane taxied the runway, also airport workers had been heard calling out gang members by name and warning,” We’re coming for you”. As other officers waved their country’s flag, the Kenyan police quickly descended the stairs wearing camouflage clothes and light helmets.
The Kenyans conducted a small military exercise before being taken away in waiting buses to their local base of operations on the airline’s grounds before dancing. Haitians, confused, responded with slogans,” They have to get fight the gangs not dancing at the aircraft”.
In the course of four weeks of widespread violence and strikes in and around the capital city, reinforcements appear to have arrived. Many group members appear to have gone under, at least for the moment, despite the loud gunfire that was heard in the town of Tabarre on Sunday afternoon.
Prime Minister Garry Conille afterwards took an extreme approach, telling armed groups that he and his brother officials, who are part of the government’s new political change, are determined to alleviate the suffering of the Haitian people. Speaking directly to the estimated 200 to 300 armed gangs that are already amok throughout Haiti. Conille said that they were determined to bring back security in order to relaunch the nation and lay a course for the holding of elections as soon as possible along with Kenya and Haiti’s other partners.
At a joint press conference with Juma at the Office of the Prime Minister, he said,” This is the time for all of those who have been causing chaos and havoc.” The state will assume all accountability for ensuring that people can resume their daily activities and activities wherever they are in the nation. Without going into great pain, we will start pursuing a quick retake of our nation.
Listing the gangs ‘ recent attacks against police stations, hospitals, schools and their release of over 4, 000 prisoners who remain at large, Conille said the Haitian people are tired. He is also certain the bandits are too, he said, declining to say whether he would accept a request by one of the gang leaders, Jimmy” Barbecue” Chérizier, for a dialogue.
” Lay down your guns, recognize the authority of the state and then we’ll see”, he said.
In recent years, Haiti has experienced a number of foreign interventions. This is the first time an African nation is leading such a force, though. The arrival of Kenyans is undoubtedly a step forward in assisting the nation in overcoming its crippling security crisis, but the plan has not yet been tested.
The Multinational Security Support mission, or MSS, is scheduled to have about 2, 500 members at full strength and cost about$ 600 million annually, despite the Biden administration’s estimate for lower costs. It was approved for a year by the UN Security Council in October. Future of the organization will be discussed next month when U.N. Secretary General António Guterres is scheduled to address the council regarding the situation in Haiti and the mission despite the delay in nine months.
Juma said she believes that” as long as there is a need for the mission”, it will be supported, but it is their hope that it does n’t become a permanent mission.
She urged us to resolve this issue and transfer it to functioning Haitian institutions. ” That is the end state we’re looking for as soon as possible”.
As for the mission’s delay, Juma said the reasons are because of the mission’s uniqueness, which required several months of developing the fundamental documents defining the mission.
Guterres reiterated his request to the member states of the UN Security Council on Tuesday to provide financial assistance for the mission so that it can successfully carry out its mission when he welcomed the arrival of the first Kenyan contingent to Haiti. A trust fund managed by the U. N. for the mission has so far amassed only$ 21 million in contributions.
Joe Biden, president, and Kenyans ‘ deployment to aid Haitian police in stabilizing the nation and ensuring that humanitarian aid is delivered to those in need. The president expressed his “deep gratitude” to each nation that has provided financial and personnel support to the mission. They have so far number 15 nations, with seven of them offering their services to the police-led mission, and the others offering funds that are still far below the mission’s estimated cost. The United States, which pledged$ 300 million, remains the biggest financial contributor to date.
According to Biden,” the people of Haiti deserve to feel secure in their homes, improve the lives of their families, and enjoy democratic freedoms,” noting that gang violence has caused the deaths of countless Haitian women, men, and children in recent years. ” Haiti’s future depends on the return to democratic governance. Although these objectives may not be realized overnight, this mission offers the best chance of achieving them.
Biden has previously stated that American troops wo n’t go on the mission. However, the United States has been the main supporter, lobbying foreign governments for volunteer personnel and funding for urgently needed projects, and writing the UN Security Council resolution with Ecuador and the United States.
The administration overturned a Republican block on funding and authorized$ 109 million to allow the mission to launch after the deployment was delayed last month due to a security assessment team from Nairobi’s discovery of several crucial equipment pieces. Additionally, Biden has used his executive power to obtain$ 70 million in weapons and other equipment for both the multinational security support mission and the Haiti National Police, whose main task will be to assist the police in their anti-gang operations.
” Haiti is an extraordinary country, and the people of Haiti deserve what people everywhere deserve: security, opportunity, and freedom”, Biden said. ” We are enriched by Haitian immigrants and Haitian Americans ‘ contributions. The United States has and will continue providing significant security, humanitarian, and economic development assistance, including my Administration’s strong support for trade preferences with Haiti”.
Protests back in Kenya
The contingent’s arrival coincided with a third day of deadly and , chaotic protests in Nairobi,  , Kenya’s capital, where youth are demonstrating against new taxes. Some protesters reportedly shot by police, who are accused of using live bullets, as they stormed Parliament on Tuesday. During the demonstrations, some protesters chanted at police in Swahili,” Tunawapigania sote tukule” — We are fighting for all our rights ( including the police ), and” Tunafight msiende Haiti” — We are fighting so that you ( the police ) do n’t go to Haiti.”
The decision of Kenyan President William Ruto to lead a foreign intervention into Haiti has generated controversy both at home and in the Haitian diaspora, where some continue to oppose the idea of foreign boots landing on Haitian soil despite the fact that armed groups are at the center of one of the worst humanitarian and economic crises in recent memory.
In the last three years alone, the violence has forced nearly 580, 000 Haitians from their homes and is currently fueling the worst hunger crisis since Haiti’s devastating 2010 earthquake. The World Food Program has reported that over a million of Haiti’s 12 million people are having trouble finding food to eat, and over a million are in danger of famine.
The U.N. secretary-general’s spokesman, Stéphane Dujarric, stated on Tuesday that while the recent resumption of commercial flights at the Port-au-Prince international airport has allowed aid organizations to airlift medicine, goods, and other equipment essential to the emergency humanitarian operations, humanitarian needs remain high in the capital and across the nation.
” For example, UNICEF says it is concerned about the living conditions of some 33, 000 people who have been displaced from the capital to Leogane, a city about 40 km from Port- au- Prince,” Dujarric told journalists in New York, adding that of the$ 674 million Humanitarian Response Plan for Haiti the U. N. launched, just 23.5 % or$ 158 million, has been funded.
More than 2, 500 Haitians have already been killed or injured in this year by armed gang violence, including 11 who were killed earlier this month when a ruthless gang attacked their farming communities in the upper Artibonite region, according to the U.N. All of this has given the mission a lot of hope, whose ability to help Haiti fight gangs in large part depends on its engagement rules, which have not yet been made public.
More than 20 months after the Haitian government, then led by Prime Minister Ariel Henry, first requested assistance from the international community, and almost a year after Ruto volunteered to lead a multinational security support mission by sending 1, 000 of his elite cops, the Kenyan government responded.
Since then, however, it has been an uphill battle to get the mission off the ground. Opposition groups in Kenya have opposed the deployment and filed a number of legal challenges, including one that is currently pending in court. Additionally, the Biden administration’s funding request was blocked by Republican leadership in Washington, which has supported the construction of a base of operations at the airport.
Another blow came from the leadership change in Haiti after armed gangs unified and launched a broad assault on important government infrastructure in late February while Henry was signing a security agreement in Nairobi to allow the deployment to take place.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken flew to Jamaica shortly after Henry was forced to resign after Washington forcibly compelled him to. On March 11, the U.S. and members of the Caribbean community aided in a new political transition in Haiti. A nine-member presidential council is in charge of the transition, whose mandate is supposed to expire in February 2026, when a newly elected president and parliament are expected to take office.
The new transitional leadership has been preparing Haiti for the arrival of the U.N.-backed mission and has been tasked with finding a replacement for Henry and establishing a new government. Despite Tuesday’s deployment, however, the security mission still has yet to share its rules of engagement with the Security Council, a step that is necessary to make it official. Only two agreements have been signed so far between Haiti and Kenya.
On Monday, prior to the officers ‘ departure,  , Ruto handed each of them a Kenyan flag, and reiterated his commitment to the mission. The U.S. had already vetted 400 of the 1, 000 Kenyan police officers for the mission. Those who are still to be deployed will be sent to Haiti as part of a series of stepped-up deployments that will include police from Jamaica, Benin, Chad, and Bangladesh.
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