Haiti crisis looms as Biden visits Canada’s Trudeau

Montreal Canada – For many months, daily life in the Haitian capital has been marked by widespread violence and deepening political instability since powerful armed gangs seized control of the streets of Port-au-Prince.

He crisis still unfolding It is expected to feature prominently in talks this week between Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and US President Joe Biden, who will make his first official trip to Canada since taking office in early 2021. .

Washington has been pressing Ottawa to lead a multinational armed force in Haiti, and Biden is expected to seek an answer from Trudeau on whether Ottawa intends to take on the mission during his visit to the Canadian capital on Thursday and Friday.

But experts say Canada is not ready to lead such a deployment, instead supporting what it calls a “Haiti-led solution” to the country’s political crisis while promoting a sanctions regime and increased assistance to Haitian National Police.

Canada “is not going to be pressured, even by a very strong and powerful neighbor like the US – in doing something you don’t want to do here,” said Stephen Baranyi, a professor of international development at the University of Ottawa and an expert on Haiti.

He said the Ottawa strategy is based on an assessment that Trudeau and other officials have publicly stated, “that previous interventions have failed, that a new approach is needed and at the core of that there must be respect and support for this idea of ​​Haitian “. directed solutions”.

“That has been a sensible position, but we have to recognize that the dilemmas that arise from that approach are becoming more acute,” especially as the security situation worsens. continues to deteriorate in Port-au-Prince, Baranyi told Al Jazeera.

“The political process is taking a long time and a lot of people ask, ‘Well, how long can Haitians wait?’” he said.

‘Specialized armed force’

The interim Prime Minister of Haiti, ariel henryasked the international community in October to help deploy a “specialized armed force” to push back gangs and restore order in the country of 11 million people.

At the time, a powerful gang coalition had maintained a weeks lock at the main gasoline terminal in Port-au-Prince, causing water and electricity cuts, forcing the closure of health facilities and severely disrupting traffic in the city.

Henry’s application won the support of the US and The United Nations, but it also sparked angry protests. Some Haitians have called for the resignation of the prime minister, who has faced a legitimacy crisis since he took office after the July 2021 assassination. President Jovenel Moise.

Haitian civil society leaders also rejected the idea, warning that a history of foreign interventions and occupations, including by the US, has shown that such deployments bring “more problems than solutions.” Instead, they called for outside forces to stem the flow of weapons into Haiti and bolster their police force.

While the United States has touted the need for an international force in Haiti, it has shown no desire to lead one. After the chaotic american withdrawal of Afghanistan in 2021, another intervention “just has political implications and carries baggage, if you will, for the White House,” said Georges Fauriol, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington, DC.

For Canada, “there is sort of a legitimate concern that this is potentially an open operation,” Fauriol told Al Jazeera. He noted that Haiti is not only dealing with increased gang violence, but also faces high unemployment, internal displacement and a health crisis.

So while “the concept of a Haitian-led solution is good,” he said, Haitians have been challenged to build consensus.

Indeed, Haiti, which largely lacks functioning government institutions, is juggling competing visions on how to resolve the political impasse. One is backed by Henry and the other by leading opposition figures and civil society groups.

Fauriol said one way to help bridge the gap in Haiti could be for Canada and the US to agree to appoint “a trusted intermediary who represents international views without putting pressure on the Haitians themselves, but at least encourages them towards a workable plan. .

“Just kicking the can down the road is not going to help,” he said.

Sanctions, other measures

In Canada, as doubts swirl over whether to send an armed force to Haiti before Biden arrives, Trudeau and his ministers have repeatedly tightened their approach to the crisis.

“External intervention like the one we have done in the past has not worked to create long-term stability for Haiti,” the prime minister told reporters in mid-March, stressing the need to strengthen the Haitian police and other national institutions. .

In recent months, Ottawa has delivered safety equipment to the police, imposed sanctions against more than a dozen Haitian political figures and other “elites” accused of being linked to the gangs and deployed a military plane in the skies over Haiti to provide aerial surveillance and intelligence information.

The Canadian government also provided C$100 million ($73 million) in aid to Haiti last year and has contributed C$12.3 million ($9 million) so far in 2023, Charlotte MacLeod said. , spokesman for Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs.

Asked if Ottawa would lead a multinational armed force, MacLeod told Al Jazeera in an email: “At all times, solutions must be made by and for Haitians. Canada is leading international efforts to support Haiti, the Haitian people and a Haitian-led solution to the crisis.”

Canada’s top general has also questioned the ability of the Canadian military to lead a mission in Haiti. “My concern is just our capability,” Defense Chief of Staff Wayne Eyre said in a recent interview with the Reuters news agency. “It would be a challenge.”

According to Fauriol, Biden’s talks with Trudeau this week are “critical” given the deteriorating security situation in Haiti. “If there’s not some kind of breakthrough at the Ottawa meeting, when you look at the schedule, you’re not really sure what’s going to happen next,” he said.

Baranyi said he believes a breakthrough is unlikely, but that each side will try to move the other closer to their respective goals. That means “the Americans will try to get Canada to move faster on planning a possible multinational force,” while “Canada will try to get Washington to expand its sanctions.”

A bridge between the two positions, Baranyi said, would be to back Haitian dialogue that could lead to limited international intervention, “mainly police, with time limits (with) clear rules of engagement,” as well as a political transition agreement that could set a path to elections.

“Without a fairly broad-based political agreement within Haiti (ie)…an international intervention will have no internal legitimacy,” the professor said. “It also might not have national legitimacy in countries like Canada.”