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re: HAITI: On The Verge of An ABYS -Gang Crisis & Famine Inside The Country
HAITI: People Will Die as Country Nears Breaking Point - Haiti Asks World For Military Help to Curb Chaos
---The United Nations is warning that hunger in one of Haiti's biggest slums is at catastrophic levels, as gang violence and economic crises push the country to "breaking point".
HAITI Crisis: Clashes and Looting as Anger Boils Over
---At least one woman was reportedly killed as protesters clashed with police in Haitian cities on Monday.
BBC 15 OCT 2022
Nearly 20,000 people in the capital's impoverished Cité Soleil area have dangerously little access to food and could face starvation, the UN says,
Across Haiti, almost five million are struggling with malnutrition.
"Haiti is facing a humanitarian catastrophe," a top UN official said.
"The severity and the extent of food insecurity in Haiti is getting worse," Jean-Martin Bauer, the Haiti country director for the UN's World Food Programme added.
The poorest nation in the Americas is suffering acute political, economic, health and security crises which have fuelled a rise in violence and paralysed the country.
Powerful gangs have blocked Haiti's main fuel terminal, crippling its basic water and food supplies.
In the Cité Soleil neighbourhood, the UN said levels of food insecurity had reached the highest level on its classification system - Phase 5 - meaning residents have dangerously little access to food and could be facing starvation.
Mr Bauer said Haitians "have gone through the gauntlet".
Anger at the government's handling of the country's multiple crises have boiled over into anti-government protests. These have escalated to looting with at least one woman reportedly killed in clashes.
On Tuesday, the World Health Organisation said there had been 16 cholera deaths and 32 confirmed cases, three years after an epidemic of the water-borne disease killed 100,000 people.
Another UN official said 100,000 children under the age of five were severely malnourished and are especially vulnerable to cholera.
Prime Minister Ariel Henry has asked for foreign military help, but the call has been criticised by some Haitians who see it as foreign interference.
The UN has since called for the immediate deployment of a special international armed force to Haiti, but it is not yet clear which countries would provide the members of such a force and what its task would be.
Gangs have taken control of key highways and Varreux, Haiti's largest fuel terminal. With food and fuel deliveries suspended as a result, more and more Haitians are going hungry.
Several warehouses run by aid organisations have also been looted, resulting in the most vulnerable going without food and drinking water.
Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world and has suffered a number of recent crises, most notably the assassination of its president, Jovenel Moïse, in July 2021 and a massive earthquake that left more than 2,200 people dead just a month later.
Police confronted demonstrators as anti-government protests descended into looting.
Looters stole a fridge from a hotel during the protest
Anger has been boiling over as gang violence has spiralled out of control, disrupting shipments of fuel and food.
Prime Minister Ariel Henry has asked for foreign assistance, but the call has been criticised by some Haitians who see it as foreign interference.
In the capital, Port-au-Prince, protesters erected burning barricades out of tyres and threw stones at police, who in turn fired tear gas. Some protesters proceeded to loot a hotel.
Shots were fired and pictures taken at the scene by a Reuters photographer showed a bloodied woman lying dead on the ground.
A protester told AFP she had been shot by the security forces: "It is a crime perpetrated by the police. This young girl posed no threat. She was killed expressing her desire to live in dignity."
Police have not yet commented on the incident.
There were also protests in the western city of Gonaïves, where demonstrators stormed a court building, and in Cap-Haïtien, on Haiti's north coast.
According to local media, many of those in the streets on Monday were angry at the prime minister's request for foreign armed forces to be deployed in Haiti, which they reject as an "interference in Haiti's internal affairs".
"We certainly need help to develop our country, but we don't need boots [on the ground]," one protester told AFP.
Prime Minister Henry asked for foreign assistance on Wednesday without going into specifics. Two days later, the government officially authorised him to ask the international community for a "specialised armed force".
The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, has since called for the immediate deployment of a special international armed force to Haiti, but it is not yet clear which countries would provide the members of such a force and what its task would be.
The situation in Haiti has deteriorated rapidly since the assassination in July last year of President Jovenel Moïse by mercenaries.
Gangs have taken control of key highways and Varreux, Haiti's largest fuel terminal. With food and fuel deliveries suspended as a result, more and more Haitians are going hungry.
Several warehouses run by charities and aid organisations have been looted, resulting in the most vulnerable going without food and drinking water.
With clean water increasingly hard to source, cases of cholera - a bacterial disease usually spread through contaminated water - have been mounting.
On Tuesday, the World Health Organisation said there had been 16 cholera deaths and 32 confirmed cases.
In 2010, about 10,000 people died of cholera in the wake of the earthquake that devastated Haiti.
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