On patrol with UN forces inside gang war zone

Two-year-old Shaina is hooked up to an intravenous drip at one of the few functioning hospitals in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. Her mother, Venda, desperately hopes this will alleviate the acute malnutrition suffered by the emaciated young woman.

Shaina is one of the 760,000 children who are on the brink of famine in Haiti.

Terrified by the gang war ravaging her neighborhood, Venda was too scared for weeks to leave her house and seek treatment for her daughter.

Now that she’s arrived at the pediatric ward, she hopes it’s not too late for Shaina.

“I want my daughter to receive proper care, I don’t want to lose her,” she says through tears.

Haiti has been engulfed in a wave of gang violence since the 2021 assassination of then-president Jovenel Moïse, with an estimated 85% of the capital now under gang control.

Even inside the hospital, Haitians are not safe from the fighting, which the UN says has killed 5,000 people this year alone and left the country on the brink of collapse.

The hospital’s medical director explains that the previous day the police confronted gang members in the emergency room among terrified patients.

Victims of violence are everywhere. A ward is full of young people with gunshot wounds.

Pierre is one of them.

He says he was walking home from work when he was caught in the crossfire of a street battle and a bullet passed through his collarbone.

“I think if the government was more stable and had implemented better programs for young people, they wouldn’t get involved in gangs,” he says of the young people who make up a large proportion of the groups terrorizing the capital.

To combat the growing violence, the UN Security Council authorized the establishment of a Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS) in October 2023.

Funded primarily by the United States, the Kenyan-led force deployed to Haiti six months ago with the task of restoring law and order.

During a patrol in downtown Port-au-Prince, the ferocity of the gang violence is clear.

Kenyan officers drive through the streets in armored personnel carriers (APCs) through once-bustling areas of the capital that are now deserted. Shops and houses are boarded up.

Burnt cars and debris pile up along side streets – barricades built by gangs to block access.

The convoy makes its way through the rubble when it is suddenly attacked.

Bullets hit the armor of the APC as Kenyan police fire their assault rifles through the portholes in the vehicle’s walls.

After almost an hour of back and forth shooting, the convoy moves forward.

But it’s not long before there are signs of more horrific gang violence. A human body burns in the middle of the street.

One of our APC Kenyan police officers says he suspects it was a gang member cornered and murdered by a rival group; his body was set on fire to send a dire warning.

The Kenyan officers on our patrol are already used to seeing this kind of brutality on the streets of Port-au-Prince, but they also tell us they are exhausted.

In June 400 agents arrived, but their number is enormous. In July, Haiti’s government estimated there were 12,000 armed gang members in the country.

The Kenyans were promised additional staff. When the UN authorized the mission, a force of 2,500 men was foreseen, but that support, which was to arrive in November, has not yet materialized.

Despite the situation, the leaders of the force remain optimistic. Commander Godfrey Otunge is under pressure from the Kenyan government to make this mission a success.

The mission commander says there is “overwhelming support” for the MSS in Haiti.

“The population demands that our team spread out and go to other places to pacify,” he says.

The uphill struggle they face is clear at a former Haitian police station, which had been occupied by a gang but has now been retaken by Kenyan forces.

It is still completely surrounded by gangs, and when the officers go up to the roof, they are attacked by snipers.

Kenyan officers respond while urging everyone to stay down.

Kenyan officials say some of their long-delayed additional forces will arrive later this year, bringing their total to 1,000.

And support is urgently needed. There are areas in Port-au-Prince that are under such strict gang control that they are virtually impenetrable to police.

In one such area, Wharf Jérémie, nearly 200 civilians were killed by a single gang over a weekend in early December.

In total, it is estimated that up to 100 gangs operate in the Port-au-Prince area, and children as young as nine years old join their ranks.

And the problem seems to be increasing. According to Unicef, the UN children’s agency, the number of children recruited by gangs has skyrocketed by 70% in one year.

One of the gang leaders they flock to is Ti Lapli, whose real name is Renel Destina.

As leader of the Gran Ravine gang, he commands over 1,000 men from his fortified headquarters high above Port-au-Prince.

Gangs like yours have exacerbated an already dire situation in Haiti and are known for massacring, raping and terrorizing civilians.

Gran Ravine is famous for carrying out kidnappings for ransom, a practice that has earned Ti Lapli a place on the FBI’s wanted list.

Ti Lapli tells us that he and his gang members “love our country very much,” but when pressed about the rapes and murders that gangs like his inflict on civilians, he claimed that his men “do things that they are supposed to do.” “They shouldn’t do it (to the members of rival gangs) because they do the same thing to us.”

The reason the children join Greater Ravine is simple, he says: “The government doesn’t create any jobs, it’s a country with no economic activity. We live on garbage, it’s basically a failed state.”

He failed to recognize the strangulating impact that gangs like his have on Haiti’s economy. Civilians, often afraid to leave their homes to go to work, are also regularly extorted for money.

With 700,000 residents forced to flee their homes due to violence inflicted by groups like Gran Ravine, the capital’s schools have become camps for internally displaced people.

Negociant is one of those who has had to seek refuge.

She sits with her five children, crammed into the small balcony section of a school they now call home.

“Just a few weeks ago I was living in my own house,” he says. “But the gangs took over my neighborhood.”

She explains that she went to an area of ​​the city called Solino, until it was also invaded by gangs and she fled along with hundreds of other people.

“Today, again, I am fleeing to save my life and that of my children,” he says.