Haiti: Gang Leader Demands Role in Peace Talks

Facts

• Jimmy 'Barbecue' Chérizier, the head of both the G9 federation of gangs and the newly-formed Viv Ansanm revolutionary gang alliance, has stated that the inclusion of him and his allies in talks about Haiti's future is an indispensable precondition for a cease-fire.¹
• In an interview with Sky News published during the Easter holidays, the gang leader also stressed, amid plans for a Kenya-led peacekeeping mission in Haiti, that foreign forces will be considered aggressors and invaders.²
• The violence that has engulfed the Caribbean nation home to 11M people in the past week could increase soon. Chérizier has claimed while adding that he and his allies, who are in control of most of Port-au-Prince, are 'ready for solutions.'³
• This comes as the Caribbean Community (Caricom) has urged the outgoing Prime Minister Ariel Henry to immediately install the Transitional Presidential Council to resolve the political crisis in the country.⁴
• According to a recent report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Haiti needs up to 5K international police personnel to tackle what has been described as a catastrophic situation in the country.⁵
• The report also claims that, while 4,451 people were killed as a result of gang violence in the country last year, this figure was at 1,554 by March 22 this year, with estimates that hundreds of thousands have been displaced and nearly 1.5M on the brink of famine.⁶

Sources: ¹NBC, ²Sky News, ³BBC News, ⁴The Haitian Times, ⁵Al Jazeera and ⁶Associated Press.

Narratives

• Pro-establishment narrative, as provided by Foreign Policy. More than just powerful gangsters, Chérizier and his allies are armed insurgents that have threatened civil war and genocide unless their political goals are met. Given that Haiti is a failed state and its government has lost authority, only an international military intervention to neutralize enemy combatants can restore order in the volatile Caribbean nation.
• Establishment-critical narrative, as provided by Washington Post. Though Chérizier represents the very armed gangs that are to blame for the chaos in Haiti, his words against foreign troops in the country reflect the view of ordinary Haitians. The country has a long and ugly history of international intervention that ended in failure and made life even worse.

Predictions