Trudeau speaks with Haiti’s outgoing PM about crisis, need for political agreement
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has spoken with Haiti’s now-departing prime minister about the ongoing humanitarian, security and political crises in that country.
A readout issued by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) late Monday said Trudeau expressed his concern to Ariel Henry about the situation in Haiti, and that he underscored Canada’s longstanding support for Haitian-led solutions.
Henry announced early Tuesday that he would resign once a transitional presidential council is created.
“The government that I’m running cannot remain insensitive in front of this situation. There is no sacrifice that is too big for our country,” Henry said in a videotaped statement.
“The government I’m running will remove itself immediately after the installation of the council.”
Henry has been locked out of his own country while travelling abroad, due to surging unrest and violence by criminal gangs that have overrun much of Haiti’s capital and closed down its main international airports.
The readout of Trudeau’s conversation with Henry says Trudeau reiterated the critical need for a political agreement among Haitian stakeholders that was inclusive and would create the conditions for free and fair elections and the restoration of democratic order.
“Prime Minister Trudeau and Prime Minister Henry reaffirmed the strong bond between Canada and Haiti,” the PMO readout noted.
Quebec has a large Haitian community, estimated at more than 140,000.
Many Haitian Montrealers are worried about loved ones amid the violent attacks that have paralyzed the Haitian capital, including Wedne Colin, who says his family members have had to flee their homes several times to find a place that’s safe from the armed gangs he says have seized control of the capital city of Port-au-Prince.
Regional leaders from the Caribbean, plus officials from Canada and the U.S., met in Jamaica to find a way out of the crisis in Haiti as more than 80 per cent of the capital Port-au-Prince is now under gang control and fears of civil war grow.
A meeting among several Caribbean leaders, Canada’s UN ambassador and the U.S. secretary of state was held Monday in Jamaica to look at ways to respond to the crisis in Haiti.
The meeting was organized by the Conference of the Heads of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), a regional trade bloc that has pressed for months for a transitional government in Haiti while violent protests in the country demanded Henry’s resignation.
Henry remained in Puerto Rico during the meeting, according to a statement from the U.S. territory’s Department of State, and was taking steps to return to Haiti once feasible.
Henry served the longest single term as prime minister since Haiti’s 1987 constitution was approved, a surprising feat for a politically unstable country with a constant turnover of premiers. He was sworn in as prime minister nearly two weeks after the July 7, 2021, assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.
Critics of Henry note he was never elected by the people, much less Parliament, since it remains nonexistent after the terms of the last remaining senators expired in January 2023, leaving Haiti without a single elected official.
U.S. announces Haiti aid
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday announced an additional $100 million to finance the deployment of a multinational force to Haiti.
Washington in the past has asked Canada to lead such a military intervention, but Trudeau has said it’s unclear whether that would stabilize the country.
Blinken also announced another $33 million in humanitarian aid and the creation of a joint proposal agreed on by Caribbean leaders and “all of the Haitian stakeholders to expedite a political transition” and create a “presidential college.”
He said the college would take “concrete steps” he did not identify to meet the needs of Haitian people and enable the pending deployment of the multinational force to be led by Kenya.
