Yesterday, the State Department held an International Partners Meeting of 14 nations (among them Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Brazil, Canada, France and the U.K.) plus an array of international organizations—largely from the United Nations—to discuss how to assist Haiti deal with its security situation. In a report to the press following the meeting, Brian Nichols, the Assistant Secretary of State of the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs who chaired it, detailed a number of initiatives that were discussed to bolster Haiti’s National Police (PNH), to strengthen its ability to fight gangs, including steps the U.S. has taken and will take to provide vehicles, weapons, training to strengthen the PNH’s SWAT team and its anti-gang task force.
Community policing, engaging with at-risk youth, gang-prevention and “reducing incentives for youth gang participation” were all topics on the agenda. Nichols announced that a number of new donors had also come forward with commitments to contribute funds and training. Haiti’s Foreign Minister Jean Victor Geneus told Haiti Libre he was pleased with the U.S. commitment, adding there had apparently been a “change of mind” in that the U.S. would now be providing “lethal aid” to the PNH. Nichols emphasized that his efforts are aimed at creating a “working-level international coordination group” to address Haiti’s “multifaceted challenges,” of which security is a priority, but also includes helping Haitians reach a political consensus, as well as fight corruption and enhance “transparency and governance.”
