Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today urged the Secu­rity Coun­cil to endorse a rapid strength­en­ing of the tech­ni­cal capac­ity of the United Nations Sta­bi­liza­tion Mis­sion in Haiti (MINUSTAH) to enable it pro­vide bet­ter sup­port to recov­ery efforts fol­low­ing January’s earth­quake in the Caribbean island nation.

In his report to the Coun­cil, the Secretary-General noted that much of the required “surge” can be achieved by scal­ing up activ­i­ties within the cur­rent man­date, while a few areas of the mis­sion should pro­vide greater tech­ni­cal, oper­a­tional and logis­ti­cal assis­tance to Haiti’s Gov­ern­ment and State institutions.

“Whereas before the earth­quake, the mis­sion was enter­ing a period of con­sol­i­da­tion, a surge effort is now needed for the next 18 months to two years, in which the mis­sion will help the Gov­ern­ment pre­serve the gains of sta­bi­liza­tion to date and enable a smooth tran­si­tion to long-term recon­struc­tion,” Mr. Ban said.

Mr. Ban rec­om­mended no change in the cur­rent strength of MINUSTAH’s mil­i­tary com­po­nent, which, as of 13 April is made up of 120 staff offi­cers and 8,186 troops, com­pris­ing 13 infantry and nine enabling units, includ­ing four engi­neer­ing companies.

He, how­ever, requested the Coun­cil to autho­rize an expan­sion of the mission’s police force to help the Hait­ian national police force re-establish a vis­i­ble pres­ence to pro­tect peo­ple liv­ing in dis­placed per­sons’ set­tle­ments after los­ing their homes to earth­quake, and to cre­ate an atmos­phere con­ducive to free and fair elections.

The Secretary-General rec­om­mended an increase of MINUSTAH’s police per­son­nel to 680, rep­re­sent­ing 200 UN police and three self-sustaining formed police units, say­ing the addi­tional offi­cers could be deployed before the end of the year, in time for the envis­aged elections.

He said the elec­tions in early 2011 are cen­tral to the Government’s vision for a renewed State. That vision must be sup­ported by the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity, the Secretary-General added.

“Rec­og­niz­ing the urgent pro­tec­tion sit­u­a­tion, the mis­sion will scale up its pro­tec­tion and human rights mon­i­tor­ing and advo­cacy, in par­tic­u­lar to address sex­ual and gender-based vio­lence, and other civil, polit­i­cal and eco­nomic, social and cul­tural rights con­cerns, in coor­di­na­tion with human­i­tar­ian actors,” Mr. Ban said in the report.

The Secretary-General thanked the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity for its gen­eros­ity towards Haiti fol­low­ing the earth­quake, but expressed con­cern about the risks the coun­try still faces in the com­ing months, espe­cially dur­ing the upcom­ing rainy and hur­ri­cane seasons.

“As we sup­port post-earthquake recov­ery, we must seek reme­dies to help Haiti address his­toric social and eco­nomic prob­lems,” Mr. Ban said. “It will also be crit­i­cal to ensure that the com­ing influx of inter­na­tional aid mit­i­gates, and does not exac­er­bate the unequal dis­tri­b­u­tion of wealth and oppor­tu­nity that long fuelled insta­bil­ity in Haiti,” he added.

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