Latest news with #TransitionalPresidentialCouncil
RTÉ News
6 hours ago
- Politics
- RTÉ News
Heraty kidnapping comes amid crisis and violence in Haiti
The kidnapping of Irish woman Gena Heraty along with seven others from an orphanage in Haiti last weekend comes against the backdrop of a rise in violence, kidnappings and exploitation in a country falling further into gang control. The UN estimates 90% of the capital Port-au-Prince is controlled by organised criminal groups. This expansion of gang activity in the country of nearly 12 million people has seen the state's capacity to govern rapidly shrink. Here, Ken Donnelly examines the current situation in Haiti and recalls Gena Heraty's outlook on the Caribbean nation in her own words. At 1am on 7 July 2021, a group of 28 gunmen stormed the presidential palace in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince and assassinated Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. Haiti has not had a president in the more than four years since. While gang violence has been a constant presence for decades, the killing of Mr Moïse left a power vacuum which has allowed criminal groups to gain a further stronghold across the country. The unelected Transitional Presidential Council which has run the country in the intervening years has struggled to maintain control with much of the country now run by paramilitary groups and vigilantes. The Viv Ansanm group, formed in recent years as a coalition of the main gang factions in the capital, has repeatedly tried to overthrow the government and has launched consistent attacks. In the first six months of this year, 3,137 people have been killed in armed violence in Haiti. A UN report on violence in Haiti earlier this year outlined how gang members continued to resort to murders, gang rapes and kidnappings to maintain their control over populations living in areas under their influence. Cases of sexual slavery, sexual exploitation, child trafficking and exploitation were also documented in the report. Gang activities have also restricted access to basic services including health care and education while hundreds of buildings, including a hospital and three schools, have been ransacked, vandalised or burned by gangs in the first quarter of this year. The UN report also described an increasingly violent environment in which many children lack role models and perceive gang members as examples of social and economic success in their neighbourhoods. "There are more kidnappings in Haiti than anywhere else in the world at the moment." As of 30 June, more than 1.3m people in Haiti were displaced, an increase of 85% since September 2024. It is against this background of armed violence, humanitarian crisis and political instability that the kidnapping of Irish woman Gena Heraty must be understood. Ms Heraty was abducted along with seven others and a child from an orphanage in the Kenscoff area of Haiti last weekend. Efforts are ongoing to secure the release of all those kidnapped. In the first half of the year alone, at least 346 people have been kidnapped in Haiti, with 1,494 people kidnapped last year. These figures are likely to be underestimations as many families of kidnapping victims choose not to report them to police and opt to negotiate directly with kidnappers. "There are more kidnappings in Haiti than anywhere else in the world at the moment." Those were the words of Ms Heraty herself, speaking in June 2023 to Miriam O'Callaghan on RTÉ radio. Just ten days ago, five UNICEF employees were released after being held by a gang for three weeks. Kenscoff - a site of increased violence A native of Carrowrevagh near Westport in Co Mayo, Ms Heraty oversees the Sainte-Hélène orphanage in the commune of Kenscoff, about 10km southeast of the capital Port-au-Prince. Since the start of this year, Kenscoff has found itself in the crosshairs of the Viv Ansanm gang, which has already taken control of several other localities. The UN has noted a specific targeting of Kenscoff this year with at least 262 people having been killed there in attacks between January and March. The UN said gang members displayed "extreme brutality, aiming to instill fear within the population". I think if I was a worrier I wouldn't be able to do what I do every day. I wouldn't get in the car." "They executed men, women, and children inside their homes and shot others on roads and paths as they tried to flee the violence, including an infant. "Sexual violence was also committed against at least seven women and young girls during the planning and execution of the attacks," the UN said in a flash report on violence in Kenscoff. Speaking in June 2023, Ms Heraty said she did not worry about her own safety, despite the immense danger faced every day. "Everybody is pretty much traumatised, because you don't know when you get in your car in the morning that you are going to make it to work safely. "We know lots of people that have been kidnapped, we know people that have been shot, we know people that have had guns pulled on them, we know people who have been kidnapped, and they haven't come back. "I worry about the people that I work with. Do I worry about myself? No. "That's not to say I think nothing will happen to me. I think if I was a worrier I wouldn't be able to do what I do every day. I wouldn't get in the car." Ms Heraty recalled situation where a local bus was stopped by gang members who boarded the bus, emptied a bag of sweet potatoes that one woman had in her possession and trampled on them. The woman complained to the gang members, asking how she would feed her kids. The gang members then shot the woman dead on the bus. "That was awful, it was terrible, but the sad thing is that there are so many people being killed. "There are more people being killed in Haiti than in Ukraine," Ms Heraty said. Organisations continue to fight for 'a just Haiti' Ms Heraty dedicates herself to the care of children with disabilities who have been abandoned, and works at a facility operated by the humanitarian organisation Nos Petits Frères et Soeurs (NPH). Throughout her conversation with Miriam O'Callaghan, Ms Heraty was keen to shift the focus away from her and towards the plight of those she cares for and works with. "These children had been abandoned, typically in hospitals, because in Haiti there are no services, there is no social welfare. "You have to try and imagine somebody with a child with severe disabilities, they don't have access to healthcare, they don't have access to wheelchairs. "They are abandoned not because the parents don't care about them, but because they don't have the resources. "My basic rule of thumb was if I was in the place of this child, what would I want?" Ms Heraty said that her and her team would take precautions and would avoid places which have had reports of shootings. The majority of kidnappings in Haiti occur on roads, boats or at victims' homes. It is common for gangs to stop public transport vehicles and abduct those onboard. Ms Heraty said while she could choose to work from her home, she worried specifically about staff that are on the road every single day. "I don't consider myself a saint, I consider myself very lucky because I have found something in life that I absolutely love, and the positive side of it also is that I am actually doing some good." "Several of them have been held up, guns put to them, and they are traumatised. I am not one to exaggerate, but they are traumatised." People being kidnapped from their place of work is less common. However, this is precisely what happened to Ms Heraty last week. Members of a gang entered the Sainte-Hélène orphanage located in Tèt Bwa-Pen in Obleon in Kenscoff at 3am on the morning of 3 August. They abducted eight people including Ms Heraty and a three-year-old child in what the NPH described as a "heinous" act. In response to the kidnapping, staff at hospitals run by NPH and a separate organisation, the St Luke Foundation, announced they would be closing all of their institutions across Haiti until the kidnapped individuals are freed unconditionally. "We say NO to impunity, NO to indifference, NO to the banalization of terror. "We will not back down. We will continue to fight for a just Haiti, where there is respect for human dignity and life," the organisations said in a statement. It is clear from her previous statements and testimonies from friends and family that Ms Heraty is equally committed to the cause of justice and progress in Haiti, despite the wave of violence and political instability. "When I'm getting ready to go back to Haiti I'll be as excited as I was the first day. Because I love what I'm doing, I love the children, I love the people I work with," Ms Heraty said, speaking at the end of her interview with Miriam O'Callaghan. "If you are lucky in life you find something that you enjoy doing. "I don't consider myself a saint, I consider myself very lucky because I have found something in life that I absolutely love, and the positive side of it also is that I am actually doing some good. "What's nicer than seeing things progress? It's beautiful. "Yes, I'm in danger from time to time, and compared to Ireland yes. "But compared to the men and the women that I'm working with. Can you imagine having a child with severe disabilities in the middle of all of that? "They're the ones that give me inspiration. I'm not going to get discouraged when I'm living with people like that."
Miami Herald
2 days ago
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Haiti ushers in last phase of transitional government amid color, class tensions
The latest transition of power in Haiti is highlighting long-standing fault lines between the country's Black majority and the mostly mixed-race business class and threatens to inflame unresolved social dynamics, spilling into the country's already volatile politics. Adding to the tensions: The U.S. State Department is weighing into the fray, accusing unnamed 'malign actors' of trying to destabilize the crisis-wracked nation by offering bribes to block the hand-over of power. On Thursday, Laurent Saint-Cyr assumed the leadership of Haiti's ruling nine-member Transitional Presidential Council from Fritz Alphonse Jean, a U.S.-educated economist, as part of a rotating presidency. Saint-Cyr represents the private sector on the council, which has some presidential powers and is tasked with restoring law and order to the Caribbean nation. Ahead of the change over, concerns over a possible coup led to increased security precautions. There was no coup, but on the morning of the swearing-in, armed gangs launched attacks on the road leading to the seat of government after Jimmy 'Barbecue' Cherizier, a leader in the Viv Ansanm gang coalition, announced his intent on social media to attack the prime minister's office and the Villa d'Accueli, where both the prime minister and Transitional Presidential Council work. Saint-Cyr is slated to remain in power until Feb. 7, 2026, which is supposed to be the end of the transition and a run-up to national elections. His ascension consolidates power in the hands of members of the country's small, lighter-skinned economic elite for the first time in recent memory, and has been for months the subject of political infighting and intense debates about colorism and class that harken back to Haiti's colonial history. Tensions peaked last week when bribery allegations surfaced amid reports of an attempt to remove Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé ahead of the changeover to shift the balance of power. Jean and other council members, along with the head of the Pitit Desalin political party, Jean-Charles Moïse, reportedly held secret talks about replacing Fils-Aimé as prime minister after efforts to dissuade Saint-Cyr from taking the helm failed. Fils-Aimé was unanimously appointed to the prime minister job in November after the council abruptly fired his predecessor, Garry Conille, after barely six months. Like Saint-Cyr, Fils-Aimé is from the business community and is considered part of Haiti's self-described 'mulatto' class, which, along with the private sector, has historically been a lighting rod for the country's ills. On Friday, the State Department took to X and, in a highly unusual post, the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs made it known Washington will 'hold accountable anyone who seeks to disrupt' the transition. 'The United States is aware of reported bribery attempts to undermine Haiti's stability,' the post said. 'We commend those [council] members for rejecting corruption and reaffirm our support for their collaborative work with the Prime Minister to work together to stabilize Haiti, in our shared national interests.' State Department officials, responding to an inquiry from the Herald, did not provide details or say what fueled the post on Haiti. They would only say that they are 'aware of credible reports that malign actors are actively seeking to destabilize the transition government.' Jean, who took over the council's presidency in March, and Moïse denied the bribery allegations, and argued they were justified in their concerns about the transition, which would place two lighter-skinned men in the two top positions of power in Haiti, because of the country's long, tortuous history in which a small, lighter-skinned minority class has long controlled the majority of the wealth. 'Analyses are pouring in on social media and on radio stations on social rifts that may occur with Saint-Cyr and Fils Aimé occupying the top of the executive branches,' he said. He also dismissed the allegations of any bribery taking place behind the scenes. 'This question of bribery is a pure narrative manipulation of political entrepreneurs fighting to keep the status quo,' Jean said ahead of Thursday's swearing-in ceremony. 'It is a desperate and trivial effort to attract the sympathy of American congressmen and women, and the U.S. administration.' The optics are not lost on Haitians, who worry about political fallout from the country's small economic elite taking such a visible role when armed gangs have targeted their properties, and foreign governments have openly accused some of them of financing the gang warfare. But critics and political observers also say that Jean and others who are part of the transition are weaponizing the class and color issue to hide their own failure to put Haiti on the path to stability. 'We have to recognize that nothing is working here,' said Pierre Esperance, a human rights advice who recently issued a scathing report on the council's failings. The presidential council, he added, 'isn't any good, the governance isn't good, and the country is not being governed. You have a group of individuals who are fighting among themselves while at the same time collecting on all the privileges the state gives them each month, and they are not doing anything for the country.' Espérance warned that if the council and the prime minister fail to take action soon to initiate a political dialogue on governance, Haiti will face even greater instability. In the 16 months that the transitional council has been in power, Haiti is no closer to holding elections or getting the armed gangs under control. Instead, the country has ceded ground to gangs, which now control up to 90% of Port-au-Prince and are spreading to other regions to the north. 'Every time there is a change on the council, there is this kind of conflict,' said Jacques Ted St. Dic, who calls the infighting a diversion to hide the failings and corruption in the system. St. Dic acknowledges that given Haiti's history, the country finds itself at a difficult juncture, where the racial conflict between Blacks and lighter-skinned Haitians could resurface at any moment. 'All of those conflicts can emerge into a battle of politicians, a real political fight,' St. Dic said. 'And that's where the danger lies.' The issue had already broken into the publicly this week, when Moïse, the head of the Pitit Dealin party, pushed back on radio on the State Department's post, and evoked the race and class question in his defense. Moïse acknowledge he had meetings about two weeks ago with Fils-Aimé about his concerns, as well as with three council members who have been indicted in a bribery scheme in which they are accused of demanding credit cards and cash from the head of a state-owned bank. Jean, the outgoing head of the presidential council, said he has spoken out about the 'danger' of Saint-Cyr and Fils-Aimé holding power at the same time. More than two centuries after enslaved Africans defeated their French colonizers, there remain deep and divisions and distrust between Haiti's mostly poor, Black population and the small, mixed-race elite in Haiti. For example, on Wednesday, Jean took to social media to distance himself from the council's support of a contract that gives elements of the private sector 24 years of control of 70% of all the cargo-container traffic coming into Port-au-Prince, after questioning its legitimacy in Haiti's economy, which relies heavily on imports and exports. Meanwhile, with armed gangs now seizing on the tensions to advance their attacks, Haitians find themselves divided about whether the new political landscape will bring more violence or help to finally pave the way for a return to stability.
Miami Herald
29-07-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Senators demand answers from Trump administration on ‘contradictory' Haiti policies
A group of Democratic senators are calling out the Trump administration on what they call its 'increasingly inconsistent' policies toward Haiti, demanding answers on both its stance on immigration and the presence of U.S. private military contractors in the country helping the government go after armed gangs with weaponized drones. A letter signed by nine senators, including Massachusetts' Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders of Vermont, is addressed to both Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. The two have until Aug. 15 to answer lawmakers' questions on how the administration can include Haiti on a list of banned countries under a travel ban, yet deem the Caribbean nation safe enough to end Temporary Protected Status for its nationals living in the United States. 'How does the Administration reconcile the security justification for Haiti's inclusion in the travel ban with its simultaneous assessment that Haiti's TPS status should be terminated because it is safe for Haitians to return home?' the senators ask. The letter comes on the heels of a visit by Haitian Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé earlier this month to Washington and ahead of a scheduled leadership change on Haiti's Transitional Presidential Council next week. It also comes amid a lack of clarity on the part of the Trump administration on what its policy regarding Haiti will be. Under the previous administration, the United States supported a Kenya-led Multinational Security Support mission to help the Haiti National Police take on the gangs. The Trump administration, while thanking the Kenyans for stepping forward, has said it cannot continue to shell out the lion's share of the cost for the mission, which officials now say has cost the United States nearly $1 billion. This has left the mission and Kenya uncertain about what will happen when the United Nations' one-year mandate comes up for renewal in September. Senators mention the Kenya-led mission in their letter, but their main concern is about a private military contractor the Haitian government has hired to help fight gangs. Last month, Fritz Alphonse Jean, the head of Haiti's Transitional Presidential panel acknowledged that the government had signed a contract with foreign contractors. But Jean declined to provide details about the deal with Erik Prince, the former head of Blackwater Worldwide, which senators are now demanding from Rubio. 'These reports raise urgent questions about compliance with U.S. arms export laws, the risk of U.S. complicity in gross violations of human rights, and fundamental contradictions in current U.S. foreign and immigration policy toward Haiti,' the letter, spearheaded by Sens. Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and Raphael Warnock of Georgia says. They describe Prince's armed operations as the 'unchecked deployment of a U.S. private military contractor with a troubling history.' Prince was brought on earlier this year to assist Haiti with a gang task force operating out of the prime minister's office. The force has been using weaponized drones and is expected to soon beef up operations, raising concerns about non-gang casualties in heavily urban Port-au-Prince. The lack of transparency around the operation doesn't sit well with them, senators say. Public sources, they say, confirm that arms have already been shipped to Haiti for use by the private military contractors, and 'such operations risk undermining the legitimacy and effectiveness of the U.N.-sanctioned and U.S.-supported Multinational Security Support mission, which is intended to stabilize Haiti through a transparent, accountable multilateral framework.' Blackwater was implicated in a 2007 massacre of civilians in Nisour Square in Baghdad, Iraq, where 17 Iraqi civilians, including children, were killed while scores of others were wounded. The incident became a symbol of the dangers posed by mercenaries. Though Blackwater is no longer in existence, neither Prince nor Haitian authorities have publicly provided the name of the company his reported 150 security contractors are operating under in the country. The subject has become thorny for many reasons. To begin, Haiti is under a U.S. arms embargo, which means that U.S. nationals are prohibited from exporting defense items or providing military services to foreign entities without prior authorization from the State Department of State, which until recently had been reluctant about greenlighting military contractors in Haiti. 'In this case, weaponized drone operations, arms shipments, and deployments of U.S. mercenaries unquestionably constitute activities requiring export licenses,' the letter states. There have been questions not just about the private military private contractors' presence in respect to U.S. laws, but also in respect to a global arms embargo the U.N. Security Council has also imposed on Haiti in hopes of controlling weapons flows into the country. U.N. experts have said that the existence of the contractors are a gray area and the global entity has been cautious about publicly criticizing them due to the building frustrations among Haitians with gangs that have already killed more than 4,000 people this year and now control up to 90% of the capital. 'What accounts for the contradiction between State's support for armed stabilization operations in Haiti and DHS's determination that TPS protections should end?' the letter asks. Senators also want to know whether expert licenses have been given to any private military contractors in Haiti, and whether the police units involved in the drone operations been vetted. 'The Haitian national police, which reportedly receives U.S. assistance, has a well-documented record of human rights violations and abuses, including credible allegations of extrajudicial killings,' the letter said. If police units units are operating in coordination with private military contractor, 'that may expose U.S. security assistance' to violations put in place by Congress, the lawmakers note. The senators also raise concerns about what they are calling the contradictory and inconsistent U.S. policy in regards to immigration. According to recent U.N. briefings, more than 1.3 million people have been displaced from their homes in Haiti; more than half are children. Nearly half the population faces crisis-level hunger, and 42% of health facilities in Port-au-Prince are not functional, the letter emphasizes. Given this reality, the lawmakers say they need clarification on the decision to terminate immigration protections for Haitians who are temporarily in the U.S. and Haiti's inclusion in a sweeping travel ban targeting countries deemed security threats. 'These two actions are contradictory: The Administration claims Haiti is safe enough to deport Haitians back to, but, at the same time, is so dangerous to block Haitians from seeking refuge in the U.S. It cannot be both,' the lawmakers wrote.
Miami Herald
18-07-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Colombian President Gustavo Petro arrives in Haiti, second visit this year
Months after making his first visit to Haiti, Colombian President Gustavo Petro returned Friday — this time landing in a gang-ridden Port-au-Prince accompanied by two of his top ministers in an aircraft stamped Republic of Colombia. Petro was received by members of Haiti's embattled Transitional Presidential Council upon his arrival at the Toussaint Louverture International Airport. His visit coincides with the official opening of Colombia's new embassy in the Haitian capital. It also comes ahead of Colombia's July 20th Independence Day — a milestone that was facilitated by Haiti, which provided arms and soldiers to help in its liberation and that of Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama from under Spanish rule. That historical significance is driving a strategic shift by Petro, who amid mounting domestic challenges at home and frayed relations with the Trump administration, is pushing renewed engagement and rapprochement with Haiti, where armed groups control most of the capital and 17 Colombian mercenaries remain jailed in the 2021 assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. With less than 10 months remaining in his presidential term, the former guerrilla member and leftist president is grappling with allegations of drug addiction by an ex-minister, growing rifts within in his cabinet and the expansion of illegal arms groups throughout the country. Meanwhile, he's been accused of undermining relations with Colombia's biggest security and trading partner, the United States, in his frequent clashes with President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on their foreign policy. 'Petro has burned his bridges in Washington and a trip to Haiti is not going to absolve his past indiscretions nor his eagerness to constantly lambaste the U.S. and its leaders at every turn,' said Eddy Acevedo, a national security and foreign policy expert in Washington, D.C. Petro's visit was announced on Thursday by Prime Minister Alix Dider Fils-Aimé, who began the week preparing for a visit by Colombia's defense minister. That visit was to focus on the military training of about 1,000 Haitians in Colombia and an agreement between the two nations over arms purchases, several sources told the Miami Herald. But quickly it turned into an official visit by Petro, who wanted to visit Port-au-Prince as far back as last August but nixed the trip after then-Prime Minister Garry Conille informed him Haiti's stretched police forces could not accommodate his large delegation while also trying to battle gangs. In January, Petro finally got his wish. But instead of flying into the capital, he flew to Jacmel, the southeastern Haitian port city that in 1806 and 1816 launched the freedom movements of Francisco de Miranda and Simón Bolívar as they sough to liberate South America from Spanish rule. During the historic visit the two nations agreed on several areas of cooperation that sources say are supposed to be ironed out during the visit, which includes Petro spending the night in the country at an area hotel. For Petro, who decided at the last minute to make the trip previously scheduled by his defense minister, Haiti has become both a symbolic and strategic opportunity that analysts say, he believes can elevate his international stature as a champion of social justice and potentially improve his strained relationship with Washington. Since taking office earlier this year, Rubio has repeatedly called for greater regional involvement in Haiti's ongoing multi-dimensional and complex crises. While he's steered clear of publicly naming countries, Rubio's remarks have been interpreted by analysts as a call to Latin American nations, most of which, apart from El Salvador and Guatemala, have yet to contribute troops or funding to the multinational security force supporting Haiti's embattled police force in its fight against gangs.
Winnipeg Free Press
04-06-2025
- Business
- Winnipeg Free Press
The international community and Haiti's time of need
Opinion To characterize the conditions today in Haiti as staggeringly grim would be a gross understatement. Indeed, the situation on the ground in the chronically impoverished country has clearly gotten worse over the last six months. But the world has largely chosen to look away rather than to confront the problem head-on. As a result, gang violence continues to surge and horrendous crimes go unpunished — such as murder, rape and kidnapping — while the drug trade deepens its grip on the country. These criminal gangs control almost 90 per cent of Haiti's capital, a large portion of the northwestern Artibonite area and a handful of municipalities in the Central Plateau region. Add to that the fact that over one million Haitians (half of whom are children) have been internally displaced and hunger is becoming more widespread (with almost six million people having trouble finding food and medicine). Hospitals have also had to close, schools are barely hanging on and there is no such thing in Haiti as a social safety net. Furthermore, there have not been legitimate democratic elections held in Haiti for almost 10 years. And Haiti's current nine-person Transitional Presidential Council has been plagued by internecine politics, corruption and impotence. Equally troubling, the existing Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission, led by some 1,000 Kenyan police and security officers, has underperformed. To be fair, they have come under heavy gang attack, recently lost two of their members, and are badly outnumbered and outgunned. U.S. President Donald Trump's administration has, moreover, only exacerbated the situation. It has largely ignored the Haitian crisis (shuffling it off to the Organization of American States), raised questions about future funding for the MSS operation and done very little to stop deadly weapons from Florida being smuggled into the country. In addition, Trump has clearly compounded the humanitarian catastrophe by gutting the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and slashing development assistance to Haiti. Trump has also sought to deport distraught Haitians, to turn away asylum-seeking Haitians and has even rolled back Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitians living in the U.S. Yes, it's true that the menace in the U.S. White House, the war in Ukraine and the crisis in the Middle East have taken up a lot of oxygen in the backrooms of power. But that's a really poor excuse for inaction on Haiti. There are things that can be done to ameliorate the conditions on the ground. Clearly, the violent gang activity needs to be attenuated and gradually neutralized so that the country can be stabilized and free and fair general elections can take place. There also needs to be an acceptable, and manifestly robust, military presence in the country to ensure order and public safety. Perhaps that will require a capable peace enforcement operation with the imprimatur of the United Nations. Most important, Haitians desperately need development assistance of all kinds (financial, medical, social, educational, governance and institutional) to get themselves back on their feet again. But we're talking here about a massive, multifaceted aid program that needs serious financial resources from any and every country that can spare it. Much of this, of course, requires large dollops of cash and political will, which is obviously in short supply these days. But there is nothing that says it has to be that way. Yet political decision-makers, and those with power to do something, have chosen not to act. It seems pretty clear that a desperately poor and mostly black Caribbean country — to say nothing of its former status as a key slave colony — doesn't much register on the international radar screen. It makes you wonder if Haiti was a predominantly white, European country whether the world's response would be so callous and negligent. Conveniently, Western governments and political leaders are quick to dismiss Haiti as fundamentally broken and simply beyond repair. Let's be honest: to them, it's a god-awful quagmire and a political minefield that they just don't want anything to do with. So they justify their inaction and indifference by labelling Haiti a 'failed state' and then blame Haitians themselves for their own misfortune. The sad reality is that governments around the world (and here I include the so-called 'Friends of Haiti' such as Canada, France and Brazil) have come to the stark conclusion that Haiti is not worth the effort to save. Stated differently, they are not going to sacrifice putting their military men and women in harm's way (or to cough up the requisite financial resources) for the sake of Haitian lives or their overall well-being. I have come to believe that this destitute country will have to explode into a continuous morass of violence and death before the world community will even notice. And even then one wonders whether the response to the ongoing crisis in Haiti will be sufficient to make a real difference. Peter McKenna is professor of political science at the University of Prince Edward Island in Charlottetown.
