Haiti

With armed gangs expanding their influence, self-defence groups morphing into gang-like entities and public officials acting with impunity, Haiti is slowly becoming something like the Wild West, according to William O’Neill, the UN’s designated expert on human rights for the Caribbean island nation.

Nearly 1.3 million people in the Caribbean country have fled their homes, with an additional 15,000 uprooted last week after armed attacks in the communes of Dessalines and Verrettes in the Artibonite department. … More than halfway through the year, the Haitian humanitarian response plan has received less than 9 per cent of the $908 million required.  

Amid runaway gang violence and crumbling state authority, the Security Council on Monday unanimously extended the mandate of the UN’s political mission in Haiti until the end of the year. Aid agencies remain deeply concerned by the humanitarian crisis playing out across the Caribbean island nation.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has appointed Mexican diplomat Carlos Ruiz as the organization's special representative to Haiti and head of the U.N.'s office in the embattled Caribbean nation, that office, known as BINUH, said on Thursday.

Since January, the UN Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), recorded over 4,000 individuals deliberately killed – a 24 per cent increase compared to the same period in 2024.  

Human Rights Watch on Wednesday urged the international community to address escalating violence and human rights abuses in Haiti, noting that conditions have been steadily deteriorating one year after the deployment of the first personnel under the UN-authorized Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission.

Nearly 1.3 million people have been forced to flee gang violence in Haiti and seek refuge elsewhere within the Caribbean country, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said Wednesday. This represents a 24 per cent increase from December 2024 according to the UN agency – the largest number of people displaced by violence on record there.

Since 30 March, clashes between armed gangs and Haiti’s multinational security mission (MSS) have increased in the cities of Mirebalais and Saint d’Eau in the Centre department. By 22 April, the clashes had killed at least 76 people. 

[…] The designation carries with it sanctions and penalties for anyone providing “material support” for the group.

Haiti is on the verge of “total chaos” as coordinated gang violence continues to escalate, threatening the State’s ability to maintain public order, the UN’s top envoy for the country warned on Monday. Special Representative María Isabel Salvador told ambassadors in the Security Council that a “deliberate and coordinated” campaign is being waged by organized crime groups to expand territorial control and paralyse the capital, Port-au-Prince.