(Image via msn.com / The Associated Press)
Business Manager: Brendan Flaherty
Email: bflaherty1@umassd.edu
Haiti gang violence has surged in the country and has caused much panic, death, and destruction.
The violence erupted around the capital, and has been an ongoing fight between the police forces and the gangs in the area. Many Haitians have never seen such carnage in ages. The surge in recent gang violence has caused Haiti to almost be cut off and stuck in a sort of war against itself.
The number of deaths has been increasing every day.
As of March 22nd, “gang violence had left 1,554 people dead and 826 injured this year,” according to a report from the UN human rights office. The numbers have been escalating ever since the beginning of the outbursts. They have even surpassed the amount of violence seen in the military dictatorship in 1990.
Since the beginning of the violence, many people have attempted to flee from the capital of Port-au-Prince, leading to an estimated 53,125 people being forced to leave their homes, or 70%.
The Capital, in particular, was one of the most populated areas of Haiti, hosting about 1,200,000 people in 2022 as reported through the city’s Wikipedia page.
Because of the mass migration, many of its former residents are forced into homes with one another, with barely enough supplies and dreadful living conditions. Many other residents are relocated to makeshift shelters to have some assembly of a home, though not all Haitians are that lucky, and most are forced into homelessness.
The violence has even spread to the school systems, forcing children to duck from the nearby gunfire. People have been killed in the crossfire, executed, and have been taken as hostages by the gang members.
So where did this all begin, and what is being done to help stop the atrocities? It all started in March of 2024 when two of Haiti’s largest prisons were raided.
4,000 prisoners were subsequently released to the public.
Since then, the gangs have attacked various government installments, including: “burned police stations…” and “opened fire on the main international airport.”
According to The New York Times, the Haitian Government has since responded by sending funds to the security teams in the form of weapons and ammunition.
The capital was only reinforced with a few thousand officers, severely dwindling since the beginning of the fighting.
“Morale is extremely low, and they cannot keep up with all alerts they have been receiving. There is nobody who is safe now in this city,” said Arnaud Royer, the head of the U.N. Human Rights Office in Haiti.
Not only has the gang provided serious troubles for the local police, but it is said that they have shown signs of coordination and training, all while sporting high-grade weaponry, including rifles and snipers.
On top of the fighting and fatigue, the people’s hunger levels have also become a problem.
“In some areas of the city, there is no more food to buy,” quotes CNN. The people still around and in the capital have been effectively cut off from aid, including food.
The rest of the country also needs food, mostly because everywhere else relied on imports that would come in through the capital. Many children have experienced varying levels of malnutrition, and sadly, not much can be done or is not currently being done to remedy the situation.
It is not exactly easy when the boxes containing the necessary relief supplies are attacked and looted before they can reach the people who need them most.
With most of the hospitals out of commission due to the fighting and lack of supplies, the citizens of Haiti are suffering. It can only be hoped that people will look upon the people with compassion and that the UN might work for a fast resolution to the rampant problem that is seemingly here to stay.
In a world plagued with death and wars, you can only hope for such senseless violence to stop and for peace to take place so those who are merely bystanders can finally live in peace again.