By: Staff Writer
February 2, 2024
Kenya is pushing ahead with plans to lead a U.N.-approved security mission to Haiti, despite a court in Nairobi last week blocking the deployment, Kenyan President William Ruto said.
The international force is aimed at tackling rampant gang violence in the Caribbean nation, which killed nearly 5,000 people last year, and is due to be initially financed by the United States.
Kenya has pledged 1,000 troops to The Bahamas, Antigua and Barbuda, and Jamaica who all subsequently said they were willing to help, with the United States pledging $200m to get the deployment off the ground. Kenya had asked for $237m initially.
Haiti first sought help in 2022 as gang violence surged but was unable to find anyone willing to take charge, with many foreign governments wary of supporting the impoverished country’s unelected administration.
Kenya, which has a long history of taking part in international peace-keeping operations, stepped forward last July and committed 1,000 police officers, saying it was doing so in solidarity with a brother nation.
Last November, the Kenyan parliament ratified the deployment of 1,000 officers to lead a multinational force in Haiti, but last week, a judge said Kenya’s National Security Council, which is led by the president, does not have the authority to deploy regular police outside the country.
It added that the council can only deploy military, not police, for peacekeeping missions such as Haiti.
The court also said there must be a reciprocal agreement between the two countries before the deployment.
Delivering the ruling, Justice Chacha Mwita praised Kenya’s offer to deploy police to Haiti, but said it needed to be carried out within the law.
The U.S., which had taken the lead in trying to find a country to head an international armed force into Haiti to help battle gangs that have taken over much of the capital, has insisted that the intervention be led by police officers and that it not be a United Nations mission.
The U.S. later co-wrote with Ecuador a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing the deployment — one of several stipulations dictated by Ruto when he agreed in July to consider helping Haiti’s beleaguered national police root out violent gangs. The Security Council approved the resolution in October.