Haiti: UN report counts 1,167 killed in three months, with abuses by gangs and security forces

More than 1,000 people were killed in Haiti between July and September, according to the latest human rights report from the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), which describes massacres, kidnappings and sexual violence by armed gangs and a rising number of abuses attributed to the security forces.

The report, summarised by UN News on 12 November, records at least 1,167 people killed and 459 injured in the third quarter. Gangs were responsible for more than 45 per cent of these incidents, and around five per cent were attributed to self-defence groups targeting gang members and people suspected of collaborating with them. The UN team said serious violations continued across the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area and in the Artibonite and South-East departments.

Massacres in Kenscoff and Cité Soleil

BINUH said that in early August gangs beheaded at least 19 people in the Cité Soleil neighbourhood, including 12 elderly women. Two attacks in the town of Kenscoff in July and August left at least 105 people dead, among them 19 children, and more than 36 victims were shot dead in the courtyard of a Protestant church. Attacks were also carried out in Saint-Michel-de-l’Attalaye in Artibonite and Marigot in the South-East, areas the report describes as previously largely spared from gang infiltration.

Carlos Ruiz Massieu, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Haiti and head of BINUH, said the scale of the massacres, particularly in Kenscoff and other localities that had previously been spared, “reminds us of the absolute need to strengthen both mechanisms for protecting the population and the presence of the State in recently liberated areas”.

Abuses by security forces

The report states that more than half of all documented killings and injuries occurred during ground or aerial operations by security forces against gangs, in some cases with the support of a private military company using drones. More than 16 per cent of the victims of those operations were not associated with gangs. At least four people, including two children, were killed and 10 others injured in attacks carried out with explosive drones.

BINUH also documented 44 cases of extrajudicial executions and attempted extrajudicial executions involving members of the Haitian National Police, compared with 14 in the previous quarter.

Kidnappings, rape and child recruitment

At least 137 people were kidnapped for ransom during the period, against 81 between April and June, and children made up 10 per cent of the victims. The UN team documented 344 victims of sexual violence committed by gang members, aged from eight to 75, with 77 per cent of cases involving gang rape. In August, at least 32 boys aged 14 to 16 who had been forcibly recruited by a gang were killed in fighting with security forces in the commune of Gressier.

Call for the Gang Suppression Force

The report urges the Haitian authorities to strengthen protection and assistance for people affected by the violence, and calls on the international community to maintain its commitment and step up the full deployment of the Gang Suppression Force, in line with international human rights standards. The UN Security Council has authorised the force, which has not yet been fully deployed, according to UN News.

The figures come after the previous quarterly report, which recorded more than 1,500 killings between April and June. For earlier developments, see our report Haiti: gang leader asks the UN to mediate as El Salvador sends 2,000 troops to find four missing soldiers.