Weather & Community Diaspora
UN: at least 5,700 killed or injured in Haiti this year; nearly 1.5 million displaced
The UN's human rights chief says gangs — and operations against them — killed or injured at least 5,700 people between January and mid-September, including more than 230 kidnappings. Displacement is nearing 1.5 million people, over 740,000 of them children.
At least 5,700 people were killed or injured by gangs — or during operations against them — in Haiti between January 1 and September 11 this year, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk told the Human Rights Council on October 2. His office also documented more than 230 kidnappings and estimates at least 1,000 women and girls were raped, figures he said are likely much higher than the confirmed counts. More than half of all casualties occurred during security operations, and recruitment of children into gangs has nearly tripled.
The humanitarian toll keeps growing alongside the violence. Nearly 1.5 million Haitians are now displaced inside their own country — about one person in eight — including more than 740,000 children, according to UN and IOM figures, as families flee neighbourhoods that gangs seize or contest.
Türk described a daily life strangled by the crisis: extortion, looting and destruction of property are crippling economic activity, and the constant danger prevents people from reaching schools, hospitals and essential services. Gangs, he warned, continue to “adapt and expand” across the country.
The High Commissioner welcomed the first operations of the Gang Suppression Force, mandated by the UN Security Council — but insisted the force “remains far below the strength needed,” backing its full, accelerated deployment with human-rights safeguards embedded.
Reporting based on: UN News (OHCHR briefing). The facts come from the credited reporting; the words are our desk’s own.
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