(22 Jul 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Port-au-Prince, Haiti – 22 July 2024
1. Officals and reporters entering briefing, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US Ambassador to the UN approaching microphone
2. Reporters recording briefing
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US Ambassador to the UN:
++ SIMULTANEOUS FRENCH TRANSLATION ++
"To alleviate the suffering caused by gang violence and political instability. This funding will help USAID partners fill gaps in nutrition, good security and shelter, and it will improve water and sanitation services and enable affected communities to purchase essential commodities. In addition, today, we are announcing a package of vehicles to support the multinational security support mission to Haiti. The package includes a substantial increase in the number of mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles through the Department of Defense. I’m also announcing that the State Department, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs intends to procure an additional broad range of armoured vehicles. This enhanced vehicle package would further assist the MSS (Multinational Support Mission) in combating gang violence in Port-au-Prince."
4. Officials at briefing
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US Ambassador to the UN:
"The president will be president until January 2025 and we will be working hard to deliver on his promise over that period and including to deliver on the promise to the people of Haiti."
6. Cameras and cellphones recording briefing
STORYLINE:
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations announced $60 million in additional humanitarian assistance to Haiti during a trip Monday to the troubled Caribbean country.
Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield also said the U.S. Defense Department would provide a “substantial increase” in mine-resistant vehicles to a U.N.-backed, multinational security mission led by Kenya to help Haiti’s national police combat widespread gang violence.
Thomas-Greenfield also said the Biden administration would allocate the resources before President Joe Biden ends his term in January 2025.
The announcement came nearly a week after a second Kenyan contingent of 200 police officers arrived in Haiti, following the first contingent of 200 officers last month.
She said the USAID assistance, which now totals more than $165 million this fiscal year, would fill gaps in nutrition, food security and shelter; improve water and sanitation services; and provide Haitians with cash to buy basic goods.
Earlier Monday, Thomas-Greenfield met with Kenyan police and leaders of Haiti’s new transitional government as part of a one-day visit to encourage action on Haiti’s humanitarian crisis and political reform leading to democratic elections that have yet to be scheduled.
There has been wide international support for the new transitional government led by Prime Minister Garry Conille, a former U.N. development specialist who assumed the post in early June.
Earlier this month, he told the U.N. Security Council that the Kenyan police will be crucial to helping control the country’s gangs and moving toward democratic elections.
Gangs have grown in power since the July 7, 2021, assassination of President Jovenel Moïse and are now estimated to control up to 80% of the capital and surrounding areas.
A surge in killings, rapes and kidnappings has led to a violent uprising by civilian vigilante groups.
According to U.N. agencies, the violence has displaced 580,000 people, more than half of whom are children, and resulted in four million people facing food insecurity.
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