The 600 additional police officers that Kenya has pledged for a multinational security support mission in Haiti will be ready to be deployed in early November, the Kenyan police chief announced on Saturday.
Kenyan President William Ruto promised these reinforcements on Friday (October 11, 2024) after a meeting with Haiti’s interim Prime Minister Garry Conille. Both leaders called on the international community to do more.
“A contingent of 600 police officers will soon join the Kenyan police already deployed in Haiti after completing pre-deployment training” said Police Chief Douglas Kanja.
“Once this training is completed, the police officers will be ready from the beginning of next month“, he added during a press conference with Garry Conille.
Kenya, the East African country leading the multinational mission to combat rampant violence on the crime-plagued island, has so far sent 400 police officers there.
Speaking about concerns about salary delays for officials already deployed to Haiti, Douglas Kanja assured that “the payment problem is solved and the police are happy“.
On Friday, William Ruto had called on the international community to come together.”emergency situation” for this mission, which faces an obvious lack of funding and equipment. Garry Conille had launched the same appeal.
The visit by the Haitian Prime Minister comes a week after a gang killing on the island left 115 people dead and more than forty injured. Members of an armed gang fired automatic rifles at residents of the town of Pont-Sondé, located about 100 km northwest of the capital Port-au-Prince, burning dozens of houses and vehicles.
The UN Security Council extended the multinational police mission for another year last month without mentioning its possible transformation into a UN force as desired by the country’s new authorities.
Haiti has long suffered from violence by armed groups, which control 80% of Port-au-Prince and the country’s main roads.
At least 3,661 people have been killed since January in Haiti, according to a figure cited in late September by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
