UN says bid to help address turmoil in Haiti less than 10 percent funded
In a briefing on Tuesday, coordinator Ulrika Richardson said that the UN hopes to raise more than $900m for Haiti this year, but that effort is just 9.2 percent funded.
'We have tools, but the response from the international community is just not at par with the gravity on the ground,' Richardson said.
The lacklustre funding numbers underscore concerns over flagging international efforts to assist the Caribbean island nation, which is reeling from violence as powerful armed gangs jostle for control of territory and resources amid political and economic instability.
Richardson said that a $2.63bn appeal for Ukraine is 38 percent funded and that a $4bn appeal for the occupied Palestinian territories is 22 percent funded, by comparison.
More than 1.3 million people have been displaced by the violence in Haiti, and more than 3,100 people have been killed this year.
Armed gangs, some with links to powerful political and economic figures, have taken control of large swathes of the capital of Port-au-Prince since the assassination of former president Jovenel Moise in July 2021.
The UN has said that cutting off the supply of arms pouring into the country, largely smuggled from the US state of Florida, is a key step towards staunching the violence, along with applying sanctions on networks connected to the gangs.
'Haiti can quickly spiral up again, but the violence needs to end,' said Richardson.
But international efforts to address the fighting thus far have little to show, and some Haitians are sceptical of such efforts given a long history of destructive interventions by outside powers.
A UN-backed policing mission, staffed largely by Kenyan security officers, has failed to bring stability to the country or tackle the gangs. Haiti's government also declared a three-month state of emergency earlier this month, covering the West, Centre and Artibonite departments of the country.
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Al Jazeera
8 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Blackwater founder Erik Prince to send forces to Haiti to fight gangs
A private security company run by Blackwater founder Erik Prince will send hundreds of fighters to violence-racked Haiti to combat the country's gang violence problem and restore its tax collection system, according to United States media reports. Prince, a controversial figure who is a major donor to Donald Trump, revealed details of the new mission for his company, Vectus Global, in an interview with the Reuters news agency on Thursday. A person with knowledge of the plans also confirmed details to The Associated Press news agency. Prince told Reuters that he expected Vectus Global, his US-based private security firm, which provides logistics, infrastructure and defence, would regain control of gang-held roads and territory in Haiti within about a year. 'One key measure of success for me will be when you can drive from Port-au-Prince to Cap-Haitien in a thin-skinned vehicle and not be stopped by gangs,' he told the news agency. He said the company would also be involved in creating and implementing a system to tax products crossing Haiti's border with the Dominican Republic once security was restored. 'Several hundred' personnel For years, Haiti has been plagued by violence and insecurity as powerful armed gangs, often with ties to political and business leaders, have vied for influence and territorial control – a situation that worsened dramatically after the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moise. The deployment of a United Nations-backed, Kenya-led police mission last year has failed to restore stability. Earlier this month, the government announced a three-month state of emergency in several parts of the country in response to the crisis. Vectus Global began its operations in Haiti in March, Reuters reported, mostly through the use of drones in coordination with a government task force. But it was set to significantly increase its activities in the coming weeks in coordination with Haitian police, Reuters reported, citing a person familiar with the matter. The source said the company would deploy 'several hundred' personnel from the US, Europe and El Salvador who were trained as snipers and intelligence and communications specialists, along with boats and helicopters. The AP, citing a person with knowledge of the plans, said the deployment would entail 'nearly 200' personnel as part of a one-year deal to tackle gang violence. It said Vectus Global would also take a 'long-term role' in advising Haiti's government on restoring tax revenue collection once the gang violence was addressed. Prince told Reuters that Vectus Global had a 10-year contract with the Haitian government, but would not comment on how much it was worth. The Haitian government has not commented on the reports, but in June, the then-leader of Haiti's transitional presidential council, Fritz Alphonse Jean, confirmed that the government was using foreign contractors. The Haitian government has identified restoring tax revenue as a key factor in tackling the country's problems. Taxation at the border used to account for half of the country's tax revenue, but gang control of transport links has hurt trade and badly affected vital government revenue streams, impacting the delivery of basic services, a report commissioned last year by Haiti's government and international organisations found. Blackwater's track record of abuses The involvement in Haiti of Prince, a former US Navy Seal who is the brother of former US Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, has prompted concerns, especially given the controversial past of his previous company, Blackwater. Prince founded Blackwater, a private military company, in 1997. The company gained global notoriety for its actions in Iraq, with four employees convicted over the September 2007 killings of 14 Iraqi citizens in Baghdad's Nisour Square. The contractors were later pardoned by Trump during his first term in the White House. Prince sold Blackwater in 2010, but has remained active in the private security industry. Since Trump's return to the White House, he has consulted with Ecuador on how to combat gang violence, and reached a deal with the Democratic Republic of the Congo to help secure and tax mineral wealth. 'Resorting to private military companies cannot be seen as a solution to insecurity in Haiti,' Gedeon Jean, head of Haiti's Center for Human Rights Analysis and Research, told AP. 'The use of private companies has often resulted in human rights violations.' Romain Le Cour Grandmaison, head of the Haiti programme at Geneva-based Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime, told AP that Vectus Global's mission in Haiti would violate US law unless it had permission from Washington to proceed. He said its involvement was more likely to complicate the crisis in Haiti than fix it. 'In the absence of a coherent, jointly led Haitian and international strategy, the use of private firms is more likely to fragment authority and sovereignty than to advance resolution of the crisis,' he said. A Trump administration official said the US government had no involvement with the hiring of Vectus Global by the Haitian government, and was not funding or exercising any oversight of the mission, the AP reported. Earlier this year, a team from US security firm Studebaker Defense ceased its operations in Haiti after two personnel were abducted, likely due to corrupt police officials, The New York Times reported.
Al Jazeera
21 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Sexual violence surged amid war in DRC's North Kivu last year: UN
Healthcare providers in the war-torn eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) treated more than 17,000 victims of sexual violence over just five months last year, according to a United Nations report. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres's annual report on conflict-related sexual violence, released on Thursday, said the cases were registered in the province of North Kivu between January and May last year, as fighting between Congolese forces and Rwanda-backed M23 rebels intensified. 'Many survivors sought care after violent sexual attacks, including penetration with objects, perpetrated by multiple perpetrators,' said the report, which charted crimes like rape, gang rape and sexual slavery. The conflict, which has killed thousands this year alone and displaced millions, is still ongoing despite a Qatar-mediated agreement between DRC and M23 last month that was supposed to pave the way to a ceasefire, running parallel to United States efforts to broker peace between Kinshasa and Kigali. Last year's figure marked a continued surge in sexual violence as the Rwanda-backed M23 rampaged through the east, with a total of 22,000 cases registered throughout 2023. That figure was more than double the previous year's tally. In 2023, the spike in violence occurred as the conflict spilled over from North Kivu into South Kivu, forcing UN peacekeeping mission MONUSCO to withdraw from the latter. The report said that MONUSCO's operations narrowed, 'owing to military operations and widespread insecurity'. The mission had documented 823 cases of sexual violence in 2024, affecting 416 women, 391 girls, seven boys and nine men. The UN said that 198 of last year's cases were perpetrated by DRC 'state actors', including the army. It found that 'M23 elements', which 'continued to receive instructions and support from the Rwanda Defence Force', were implicated in 152 cases. According to the report, survivors reported that they were exposed to the threat of sexual violence while searching for food in the fields and areas around displacement sites. Many displaced women had resorted to prostitution to survive, 'highlighting the nexus between food insecurity and sexual violence'. Denis Mukwege, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018 for his work combating sexual violence in DRC, told The Times newspaper this year: 'When you have people raping with complete immunity – and think they can go on and on without any consequence, nothing will change.' Guterres's report charted violations in 21 countries, with the highest numbers recorded in DRC, the Central African Republic, Haiti, Somalia and South Sudan. While women and girls made up 92 percent of victims, men and boys were also targeted.
Al Jazeera
a day ago
- Al Jazeera
The day Israeli settlers lynched two young men in the West Bank
A mob of Israeli settlers attacked Palestinians who were out among their olive groves. Two young men were killed, tens were injured. Mazraa, occupied West Bank - Kamel Musallet was at home in Florida, United States, when he last spoke to his son Sayfollah (Saif), who was visiting their ancestral hometown of al-Mazaraa ash-Sharqiyah (Mazraa) in the occupied West Bank. Saif, 20, was in high spirits, telling Kamel he might have found the woman he wanted to marry and talking about how to start the arrangements. Four days later, Kamel woke up the morning of July 11 to a call from his younger son, Muhammad, 18, telling him that settlers had attacked Saif. At the time, Saif was lying on the ground near an oak tree where he had hidden to get away from rampaging settlers; he was unconscious and having trouble breathing. By the time Saif had been carried to an ambulance, he was dead. Saif's friend, 23-year-old Muhammad "Rizik" al-Shalabi from Mazraa, was found later in the night - shot, beaten, tortured and left to die of his wounds. Al Jazeera spoke with witnesses, victims, town officials, first aid responders, and search and rescue volunteers. This is the story of how Saif and Rizik were lynched by a mob of Israeli settlers. On July 11, after the noon Dhuhr prayer, Saif, Rizik, and about a half dozen friends decided to go to al-Baten to hang out in one of their family's groves. Al-Baten is the expansive, hilly area of olive groves between Mazraa and the neighbouring town of Sinjil, dotted with about 45 holiday homes largely owned by Palestinian Americans from the surrounding towns. (Al Jazeera) Several of the young men were still in their prayer clothes when they parked at the bottom of the hill leading up from Sinjil to al-Baten on the hot July day - they were only planning to stay for a little while. The friends were hanging out, joking and laughing, when at about 2:15pm they were approached by about a dozen settlers, many armed with clubs or sticks, and some with guns. The settlers began to throw rocks at the boys, as videos from that day showed. Another video by Israeli far-right settler Elisha Vered suggested that rocks were thrown by some of the Palestinian young men in response. The young men began to run, trying to escape the violent settlers, who called other settlers to join them. Thus started an attack that unfolded over several hours, drawing in some 70 settlers who chased and attacked everyone they could find in al-Baten, injuring 50 people and killing two. There were 1,449 settler attacks on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank in 2024. In 2023, 863 incidents were recorded between January and October 7, followed by an additional 428 attacks in the less than three months that followed the start of Israel's war on Gaza. In the first half of 2025, there were 759 attacks documented. (Al Jazeera) Saif was born on July 28, 2004, in Tampa, Florida, United States, to a family of US citizens. He lived in Florida until the third grade, when the family moved to Mazraa in 2012, moving into a neighbourhood known as 'Little America', lined with large houses owned by Palestinian American families. Growing up, Saif became known among family and friends for being the fun one, always making people laugh. Saif visits a beach with his aunt, Nihad [Courtesy of family] Ten years later, after Saif graduated from high school around the corner from the family home in Mazraa, he moved back to Tampa to run the family's new business: an ice cream shop called Ice Screamin. An emotionally exhausted Kamel described his eldest as a respectful son who worked hard. 'Every time people gave positive [customer] reviews, he would send it to me,' he said, standing outside their Mazraa home. 'I told you! I told you!' Saif would tell his father. 'I'm the best one at customer service.' After working six days a week for more than a year, Saif wanted to return to the occupied West Bank for a two-month visit. He arrived in early June, while Kamel returned to Florida to keep the business running. Kamel with Saif in an undated photo [Courtesy of family] Saif wanted to use the time to relax, reconnect with his mother and siblings, as well as with his friends in town. Like his friend Rizik, who had graduated from the same high school and was a known athlete and long jumper. Both boys grew up as devout Muslims. Saif was also hoping he would meet someone he could marry, encouraged by the number of his friends getting engaged. On the day of the attack, the friends separated in a panic, chased by the armed settlers, one of whom had opened fire in their direction. As the group began to run east towards Highway 60 and Mazraa, Rizik and three other young men ended up veering north, while Saif and the others went south. But several pick-up trucks, each with three or four settlers, came down Highway 60 and roared onto the lands of al-Baten, leaving the group trapped between settlers chasing them from above and settlers in trucks on the road below. Two vehicles driven by settlers chased and rammed two of the boys. By 2:30pm, villagers had received beseeching messages from the hunted Palestinians and came to the dirt road leading to al-Baten to try to help. But a military drone flew over, releasing tear gas onto the villagers, then an Israeli army vehicle arrived, its soldiers throwing additional tear gas canisters at them. 'At that moment, we didn't know what the injuries were,' recalled Motaz Tafsha, the mayor of Sinjil. 'Who was wounded? What was the damage? Is anyone alive? We don't know.' (Al Jazeera) Rizik ran on. Next to him was a young man who spoke to Al Jazeera later, requesting anonymity for his safety. He said Rizik fell while jumping over a stone wall, hurting his legs, but that when they saw two boys who needed help, Rizik joined the young man in carrying them to safety. But then Rizik and his friend found themselves surrounded by settlers. They ran, but just as he dove for cover in the bushes, the friend saw a settler shoot Rizik in the chest. 'The settlers started shouting: 'Yes! I got you!'' he recalled, describing how several settlers gathered around Rizik as he lay on the ground. At about the time of the shooting, Rizik had called his family, but the family told others the call lasted only seconds, with no response from Rizik, although they heard shouts in Hebrew in the background. Rizik's friend ran for his life down the side of the mountain, heading east. At 3:18pm, he sent a panicked voice message to local WhatsApp groups, begging for help: 'Someone's been martyred!' he beseeched. [Audio]: Witness to Muhammad Rizik al-Shalabi's shooting, believing he's been killed and sending a voice message calling for help. Later reconstructions estimated that Rizik may have still been alive at the time, but he was dead by the time search parties were able to access the area to look for him. Meanwhile, Saif and others were running for their lives further south, headed towards Ain al-Sarara. As family members confirmed to Al Jazeera, one of those young men was caught along the way and tied up by a gang of about nine settlers. Witnesses say the settlers repeatedly smashed the young man in the knee with their weapons, then dragged him, tied up, into a car and shot bullets all around him. Then they threw him to the ground over and over, until the young man was begging them to kill him. 'They said: 'I'm not going to kill you,'' a friend recalled on TikTok. ''I'm going to chop off your arms and your legs and throw you on the side of the road like a dog.'' According to Sinjil activist Ayed Ghafari, among the settlers was Yahariv Mangory, reportedly the leader of the outpost builders in al-Baten, who was carrying an M16 rifle. Mangory later identified himself in an interview with Israel's Channel 14 as the 'owner' of the al-Baten outposts. (Al Jazeera) Saif and the others had managed to go up a hill, but at about 3:30pm, they were met by a group of settlers coming downhill and attacked them from above, according to Ghafari, who spoke with the young men. The settlers were pelting the young men with rocks, with occasional bullets zooming past them as they made their way down the hill. A settler hit Saif square in the back with a rock, toppling him. He was instantly surrounded by a group of settlers who beat him with clubs and sticks all over, according to witnesses. Dazed, Saif staggered to his feet after the settlers stopped beating him, heading south down the hill until he came across a big oak tree where a young Palestinian man was hiding. Battered, he sank to the ground there for the next two and a half hours as the young man tried to reach out to people from Mazraa, asking for help. Saif was vomiting and struggling to breathe, his condition worsening by the minute. That was when Muhammad caught word that his big brother was in trouble. (Al Jazeera) Palestinian ambulances were trying to reach al-Baten as early as 2:45pm, as news of what was happening got out, but they found their access blocked by both Israeli settlers and soldiers. Mayor Tafsha was coordinating with the military liaison very soon after the attacks began, requesting permission from the Israeli army to bring ambulances to al-Baten. The army conveyed permission for ambulances to enter the area, yet one of them was attacked on the road. As the ambulance approached, settlers in a pick-up truck going the other way on Highway 60 threw stones at it, damaging the windshield. The team stopped to assess the damage, only to have another truck of settlers break through the back windshield and vandalise it. At about 3:30pm, Tafsha recalled seeing settlers near al-Baten attacking a group of Palestinian teenagers and blocking the entry of arriving ambulances. Then, despite the military liaison's permission, the army also blocked the ambulances from entering al-Baten, delaying their entrance until they were let through at about 4pm. Within 10 minutes, the ambulance found the young man whose knee had been shattered by the settlers, took him back to town so he could be transferred to the Istishari Hospital near Ramallah. Then it returned just before 5pm to pick up another injured man. When the ambulances tried to come back again, the military stopped them for about 40 minutes, according to Tafsha, who was there at the time. 'And then a young man came out to us and said: 'Hey, I have someone with me who is in danger, [he's] suffocating … unable to breathe,' recalled Tafsha. When Muhammad heard his brother was in trouble, he and a friend set out to find him, determined to get through the rampaging settlers and Israeli soldiers. Another group of young men had headed out a little earlier, also to find Saif, worried by the pleas for help that were coming from the young man under the oak tree. Separately, the two groups trekked about eight kilometres (five miles) until they found Saif, arriving within about 20 minutes of each other, with Muhammad and his friend arriving last, at 5:20pm. Once they got there, they could do nothing other than wait and hope that an ambulance would arrive soon. The terrain was too rough for them to try to move Saif, as they weren't sure what his condition was, and even if they were to try to move him, they didn't know which direction was safe. It was only later that an ambulance crew was able to walk across the rough terrain to reach the oak tree with the worried young men huddled around an unconscious Saif. It was about 6:05pm when they loaded him onto a stretcher, and the group walked the 20 minutes back to the ambulance waiting on the nearest road. By the time they reached the ambulance, Saif had died. It was then that Muhammad called his father. 'I don't know how to tell you this,' an emotional Muhammad told his father, 'but your son, my brother, is gone. "I've seen his last breath.' Saif was brought to the clinic in Sinjil. While there, Tafsha received a call from Rizik's mother, who said he was missing. Tafsha contacted the Palestinian liaison, who checked with the Israeli army, which in turn told the liaison that it had detained Rizik. But reports were coming in from witnesses to the settlers shooting Rizik earlier in the day, and Tafsha relayed that information to the liaison. The response came through from the Israeli army: in fact, they had detained someone else, not Rizik. In speaking with Al Jazeera, Ghafari called this kind of confusion over Rizik's identity as being a case of 'dirty tricks' from the Israeli army. 'I immediately asked the liaison that we go out and look for him,' recalled Tafsha. 'And I told all the young guys to go out with me and wait for permission [from the military liaison] to search.' It was dark already by the time the search started, led by Rizik's friend who saw his shooting. Rizik's body was found at about 10pm. The first man to see Rizik's body, who also wished to remain unidentified, said it was clear that he had been badly beaten by settlers - his hand was clenched and his arm contorted. The US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, called Kamel to offer his condolences and said he would ask Israel to launch investigations into what happened. 'I know I'm not going to get justice,' said Kamel outside their family home. 'But if we can stop the Israeli settler extremism, and the vandalism and violence … I just want to save [al-Baten].' According to The Times of Israel, six settlers were arrested for the incident, though no follow-up was offered. 'I expect that there won't be any results,' said Tafsha of the investigations. 'In the end, they will come up with a million reasons for barbaric and terrorist actions against our country.' Instead, residents told Al Jazeera later, Israel detained three activists and a boy from Mazraa. Soldiers pulled one of the activists out of an ambulance, detained him, then released him later. Having no faith in the Israeli justice system, Kamel is calling for the US Department of State to launch an investigation itself. The July 11 lynching was the culmination of an escalation in settler encroachment on Sinjil lands that had taken place in the last three months. In April, the first of three settler outposts was built in al-Baten, and settler attacks ensued immediately. Between January 2024 and June 2025, at least 35,969 Palestinians were displaced across the occupied West Bank. The vast majority - 29,338 people, or 82 percent - flee violent Israeli military raids. An additional 2,825 (8 percent) were displaced due to home demolitions and 1,133 (3 percent) as a result of settler violence. Some 2,673 (7 percent) people lost their houses because Israel said they did not have building permits, which are known to be nearly impossible to get if you're Palestinian. Sinjil, Mazraa and al-Baten are split between Areas A, B and C. Area A, according to the Oslo Accords, is under the Palestinian Authority's security and civil control, while Area B is under Palestinian civil and Israeli military control and Area C is under full Israeli military control. The initial attacks that day occurred in Area A, according to locals. The vast majority of illegal settlements and outposts, and attacks on Palestinians by the settlers living there, are in Area C, under full Israeli military and civil control. Since April, Israeli settlers have been prowling the land, attacking Palestinian villagers with sticks or weapons and setting Palestinian groves on fire. Today, much of the fertile land on al-Baten's rolling hills stands blackened and untended, its owners afraid to go there. (Al Jazeera)
