By UN News Centre

5 Jan­u­ary 2010 – The United Nations peace­keep­ing mis­sion in Haiti (MINUSTAH) is help­ing the impov­er­ished Caribbean coun­try pre­pare for upcom­ing leg­isla­tive elec­tions, pro­vid­ing sec­ondary sup­port in logis­tics, secu­rity and rais­ing pub­lic aware­ness while leav­ing the pri­mary orga­niz­ing role to the national authorities.

“It is the respon­si­bil­ity of the Hait­ian author­i­ties to orga­nize good elec­tions,” Marco Donati, the senor UN offi­cial in the south­ern region told a recent meet­ing in Les Cayes to encour­age the local youth to par­tic­i­pate in the polls. “MINUSTAH is merely play­ing a sec­ondary role in the elections.”

The mis­sion is also help­ing the author­i­ties to main­tain a sta­ble polit­i­cal atmos­phere con­ducive to elect­ing the country’s leg­is­la­tors, he added.

MINUSTAH has been on the ground in Haiti, the poor­est coun­try in the West­ern Hemi­sphere, since mid-2004 after then pres­i­dent Jean-Bertrand Aris­tide went into exile amid vio­lent unrest. Cur­rently there are more than 9,000 mil­i­tary and police per­son­nel deployed and nearly 2,000 civil­ian staff.

The mis­sion plays a multi-faceted role, rang­ing from help­ing to re-establish secu­rity in con­junc­tion with the national police force to human­i­tar­ian aid and improve­ment of infra­struc­ture such as roads and bridges.

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=33409&Cr=haiti&Cr1=