BAI’s letter to the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and IJDH’s Brian Concannon are featured in CTV News.

“Mario Joseph, the managing attorney of the Bureau des avocats internationaux based in Port-au-Prince, said in a November letter to the Caribbean Community that an international intervention would “prop up the unconstitutional, corrupt and repressive de facto government and stifle legitimate dissent.”

Joseph said that the last major UN stabilization mission in Haiti, which ran from 2004 until 2017, “set the stage for today’s spectacular rebound of gang violence” and left Haiti less democratic than when it arrived.

“We do not want our (Caribbean Community) sisters and brothers to come with guns to help powerful countries impose a repressive regime on us.”

…

A foreign intervention remains “highly unpopular” in Haiti, said Brian Concannon, executive director and co-founder of the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti.

“The troops who go down there are going to be fighting the people that they were sent to protect. And neither the Canadian nor American governments want that on the news, that their mostly white soldiers are shooting at Haitian civilians,” said the former UN official and human rights lawyer.

“So they’re trying to get somebody else to be the face of that mission.”

The public largely sees the unelected government as responsible for the disarray, Concannon said. Though he conceded that it makes sense to liaise with current officials on humanitarian aid, he said it’s time for the international community to stop inviting Haiti’s leadership to the table on a security solution.”

Read the full article here.