The deputy for Saint-Barthélemy and Saint-Martin, Frantz Gumbs, sent a letter on March 12 in his capacity as president of the France-Haiti Friendship Group to the Minister of Europe and Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Séjourné in order to to question him on the tragic and disastrous situation in Haiti.
Letter signed by three other deputies namely Eléonore Caroit, deputy for French people established outside France, Olivier Servant, deputy for Guadeloupe, and Marcellin Nadeau, deputy for Martinique, it begins by recalling that “year after year, the country "is sinking into a deep security, political, economic and humanitarian crisis." Faced with the latest damning report from the UN Secretary General which counts 8.400 victims of gang violence in Haiti in 2023 (an increase of 122% compared to 2022), the four deputies add that "the month of January 2024 was even the most violent in more than two years in Haiti, according to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, which describes a health system on the verge of collapse, schools and businesses closed, children more more exploited by gangs, a suffocated economy... This, without taking into account the other ills of the country: corruption, arms trafficking and chronic impunity. Today, the security situation is getting even worse: “Haiti is facing a surge in violence around the capital, Port au Prince and in the western region. Armed criminal gangs carry out shows of force and carry out attacks targeting strategic sites, giving rise to extremely violent clashes between these gangs and the country's security forces. Thus, the attack on the national penitentiary and that of the Croix des Bouquets prison led to the escape of a very large number of inmates, leading to a very worrying situation and a climate of terror.” In this context, the capital has been under a state of emergency since March 3. For the France-Haiti Friendship Group, it is “urgent to come to the aid of the Haitian population and to restore security in the country, an essential prerequisite for the resumption of a political process to end the crisis.” In October 2023, a multinational support mission was approved by the UN but faced with the extremely complex reality on the ground, it is now proving delicate. Frantz Gumbs and his colleagues specify that “France has a duty of solidarity, must come to the aid of the population and provide support to Haiti so that the country can get out of this impasse” and ask “Mr. Minister, in this context, what is France's position? Faced with the current emergency, does France intend to further assert its role in security, political and humanitarian terms? As a result of this violence, a significant number of the best minds have left the country. Could France contribute to the reconstruction of the administrative and technical human resources necessary to restore this battered country to working order? ". _VX
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