Carlos Ruiz Massieu (BINUH) on the question concerning Haiti - Press Conference

Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us in the room and online. We have with us Carlos Ruiz Massieu, who, as you know, is the head of our political office in Haiti, BINU. He just finished briefing the Security Council and consultations, and he is with us. He will make a few opening remarks, and then we will take some questions. Carlos, you have the floor.

Thank you.

Crisis, a recognition that we have— that there is a window of opportunity, but that we need to seize precisely that opportunity, and that, as I mentioned, because of the nature of the crisis, we need clearly a comprehensive approach. Securities and security improvements are evidently essential, but to everything else, but still that we need to support the country in the way that we are trying to support it through humanitarian support, through security-mandated force, security force supported by the UN through our mission also, and with the political work and accompaniments that we do through the political mission. Some positives that were mentioned and were briefed to member states and their reaction in terms of the start of operations of GSF that, you know, started last month, and other important steps on the political side, on the electoral side, by approving the budgets, by moving forward with a revised electoral decree, and now expecting a revised calendar of elections with a clear clear understanding, I would say, that while security is so important to elections to happen, at the same time, the political process and security improvements need to move at the same— simultaneously, so we can have further stability in the country on the security front, on the humanitarian side, but also on the political side. So I will leave it there. I'll leave it there just to open if there are specific areas that you want me to go more thoroughly or to any questions. Evidently, I'm here. Sorry for the time, for the lateness. It was a long session though.

Very good. Thank you so much. Do we have some questions in the room? Yes, go ahead, Chinois.

Thank you, Ms. Bossier. Haiti has been kind of a failed state for decades. The UN has committed tremendously to this country, but we don't see much progress for these past decades. What is your estimation of the future of this country? What's the problem?

Well, evidently, as you mentioned, we have a long history in working with Haiti, with the Haitians, in trying to improve the situations. And throughout the history, we have made— we have had important successes, relative successes. We have had mistakes. We have shortcomings. We have successes that then have not been long-lived and will be short-lived. But I believe we have learned all collectively from those experiences, the positives, the not so positives, the things that we can do better. And in this case, I do believe with some optimism that we can help clearly to improve the situation on the security side, as I mentioned, but also to help the countries, the country moving on other areas. At the end, it's clear that it's a Haitian-led process and they are the ones responsible for the successes or not. But at the end, we are there to help and support. And the right— as I mentioned, the decisions that were made to have this, I would say, innovative approach with a more offensive force because of the situation that we are facing, particularly in Port-au-Prince and in the departments next to it and other challenges required a different approach, and we are moving forward with this approach. Still, it's early in the sense of the deployment strength that is still not where it will be. It's still early in terms of coming back to democratic rule, democratic governance, because of the transitional nature of the government. But I do believe that we have a chance to contribute to the improvements and the discussions that are taking place these days is about how to make those gains more sustainable so we don't go back after getting some positive results. And that's why we are working with the Haitians on DDR programs, on ways to help and push, evidently, for the release of the minors, release of the children that, you know, compose a very high percentage of gang— of the gangs, but to also have investments and promote investment in certain areas so we can also reduce the potential of the recruitment in general, but the recruitment in the children or of the youth in particular. So I would say that the prospects— we have to be optimistic in improvements, but evidently realistic in terms of that this is an endeavor that we are taking together with the Haitians, the international community, and it is very challenging, but we need to do our best to make it a success story in the short term, hopefully, or in the medium term.

Very good.

Thank you.

Oh, go ahead, go ahead.

Okay. We know lots of weapons are going into the hands of the Haitian gangs from the United States. Forgive me for my ignorance, do you have a mechanism to check this the flow of weapons?

Yes, we— as you know, there's a panel of experts that verify the observance of many aspects of— that are part of the sanctions committee, and there's an arms embargo. They have— they visit the country regularly in order to get all the information that they get on different aspects, but including on this. But also, What we are putting in place on the one hand through the JSF themselves and on the other, whatever the UN can do in that regard, is whenever they seize weapons and they and we expect a lot of seizures in the in the near future, they will cross-check that those weapons with a system that is called eTrace. So to know where the weapons come from or the ammunitions, and that they can then assess more clearly. Where the weapons come from and request from those places of origin to do or to increase, to strengthen the measures so we don't get more weapons into Haiti as we will be recovering some. So the idea is evidently to recover some, but also to start or to continue or to strengthen all the measures needed in order to reduce the flow of weapons to Haiti because we know So that's an issue. Internally, we also need to— and the Haitians are very committed to oversee whether there are also internal trafficking of particularly ammunitions from the forces to whatever groups are out there. So we need to strengthen all the measures to do that and to stop— to reduce and hopefully to stop the flow of weapons and ammunitions.

Thank you.

Thank you. Dulcie, go ahead, then I will go online.

Okay, thanks very much. Can you tell me, because there's a lot of negative press about the Haitian government, who's actually in charge of the government? And this system you described just now about tracing arms flows, who's going to be leading that and how will it work? And what is your best method for stopping children from being swept up in gangs? Thanks.

Thank you. Yeah, I'll start with the last point and question. There is a twofold process. On the one hand, Because the gangs, some of the gangs are listed in the Secretary-General report on children in armed conflict as utilizing children, recruiting children. We need to establish now a system by which there will be engagement with those gangs in order to request and to demand the release of the children. That's one element of it. The other Thank you. Clearly, when operations will take place and there will be more, I would say, results of those operations, hopefully capturing gang leaders, gang members, there'll be also, let's say, recovering of children. And minors under 18, as you know, according to UN instruments, are victims first and foremost. So they need to be channeled through the social services passing through some mechanisms that we have through our agencies. UNICEF have particular transition centers for children to have short stays there so they can get psychosocial support and other means. But in the long run— in the long run, and we are working with the Haitians and the institutions on that, we are establishing a DDR program because then you need to link those children released or recovered of the gangs to those transition centers, but then to vocational trainings, to different capacity-building activities so they can be linked afterwards to job opportunities. And I'm saying this because in all these steps, we need to avoid or to reduce the risks of the children getting back to the gangs. And also, we need to implement, again, preventive measures, because while we are hoping and confident that we can recover minors, that some minors will be released, we don't want the gangs at the same time to continue recruiting children and children be prone or subject to those activities. So we need to— part of the program should be violence reduction, community violence reduction activities that include investment and possibilities of getting opportunities currently already for the children that we can consider, or this UN system can consider children at risk. So they can— so it's, I would say, an overall general two-pronged approach in that sense. A preventive one, but also once established or implemented to those that will be recovered either in the operations by the JSF or that the other groups are— will be more willing to start releasing them. So those are the two things. I forgot your first or second comment, just if you can repeat it, if that's okay with you. I forgot my pen, I have to say.

Who's governing Haiti?

Ah, the transition. Well, we have a transition government that after February 7th stayed in accordance with certain provisions of the agreement that was the origin of the previous transitional arrangement of the electoral— sorry, the Transitional Council of Presidents. So the Prime Minister— the Council of Ministers led by the Prime Minister, is in charge and in accordance with an instrument that they signed among the different political forces, he will stay in power until elections happen and there will be a more, let's say, going back to democratic order. That's why elections are so important so Haiti can have, after 10 years, a new electoral process. They can have legitimate elected authorities, and they are making important steps towards there. Evidently, as I mentioned, there's a link between security conditions, particularly in the capital and in other departments, because those departments and the capital have around 54-55% of the overall electorate registered these days. So security needs to improve in those areas. So Candidates can campaign, and eventually on election day, people can vote in a free manner. So for now, we have a transitional government, again, just recapitulating, led by the Prime Minister, and will stay until elections happen, but we hope it will happen soon. That's the aim. That's part of their priorities of the current government: elections, security, and humanitarian situation.

Let me now go online to Jacqueline Charles from the Miami Herald, and then I will go to Danica.

Hi, thank you. I have 2 questions. One question is on the election dynamics. Even in the best of times, pulling off an election in Haiti has always been a very complicated process that, you know, I remember the last one we had, the UN was on the ground, you were using donkeys, you have to get into faraway places. We're talking about a a dynamic situation here that even, you know, if people register today, there's no guarantee that they will still be in those same registration conscriptions 6 months from now or whenever the elections are held. So I'm just wondering in terms of, is there a contingency plan on how we are going to ensure that people have the opportunity to vote if they, if they want to vote? And my second question is, Ambassador Waltz today, during the US intervention, he broke away from the measured tone that typically characterizes these Security Council meetings on Haiti and gave a very personal account of what he had encountered during his visit there. We haven't really had members of the Security Council visit for a long time. What, what impact do you think or you hope that this will have on you know, the reality for, for the decision makers. You know, this was not statistics. This is not a report from the Secretary-General, but this is a member of the council who actually went and heard the stories for himself.

Thank you. Thank you, Jackie. The— yeah, on the first point. Yeah, I mean, there's progress, as I was mentioning, on the electoral process, and I think it's important that we are moving forward. Now, clearly, there are processes that will take time, like the voter registry that started today, or is starting today, and still— but still will take some months. And then after that, the political parties need to receive the final electoral registration 60 days, as I recall from the, from the decrees before Election Day. So we are very tight. Evidently, we have to be ready to implement all the measures that we can in order to help elections to happen. So far, in terms of the international support, we are coordinating the international support. We are coordinating the work of the UN on that and the UNDP. Is pretty much helping the CEP, the Electoral Council, in managing its budget. It's also— UNOPS is helping in the logistics of elections and on all the operational aspects going forward. I'm sure, and we have discussed that very preliminarily, but if needs be, we will We'll talk— we have a preliminary discussion with UNSO whether we can also put our assets to help in the transportation of electoral material, very sensitive electoral material. So we will do whatever we can to support electoral process to happen. But the main issue is still, it's about what are the minimum conditions under which elections could happen. And what is the right time between then having those minimum conditions and the country that needs to move forward to back to democratic rule? And we want evidently to have the transitional government with all the support needed in order to do their part. But transitional governments are of transitional nature and limited duration. So we don't— we need to find that How do you say it? The perfect spot in terms of timeline and conditions. I mean, we want in the sense of we wish, because at the end it will be for the CFP and the government to agree on that ultimate date of elections, but there's other aspects that come before that. Now, I have to say that it's very positive when members of the Council visit the country that we're working on. I experienced that myself in other responsibilities that I have had before, to have Ambassador Waltz very recently visiting Haiti, seeing the reality, talking to people, talking to children that have been affected evidently by the gangs, seeing how the GSF is It's started its operation and it's given really a different perspective on how things are moving. Besides, I mean, as much as we can transmit, and we are— we believe we are good at transmitting the situation, at the end, nothing compares to a personal visit that can see and talk to people, to authorities on the ground, et cetera. We hope that the Security Council can travel soon. Evidently, there's always a wish for the Security Council to travel. We just have to see, being a 15-member council, that we have the right conditions under which we can have the setup for 15 VIPs traveling to the country to assess. But if we can, believe me, we will do it as soon as possible. But we have to then assess very thoroughly.

Thank you.

and vis-à-vis a potential agenda as well.

Very good. Danica, Danica Cotto from Associated Press. If you're able to turn your camera on, Danica, please go ahead. Otherwise, we will just listen to you.

Hi, sorry, I got pulled into something else, so I'm not able to turn camera on right now, but appreciate this opportunity. I was wondering, could you identify the Could you repeat the 3 departments mentioned by Haiti's foreign minister where insecurity persists? And could you repeat the percentage of the electorate that lives there? And also wanted to check that voter registry literally began today. Thank you.

Okay. I was trying to write down very fast, but I couldn't probably.

Okay.

On the departments, I mean, the West Department where Port-au-Prince is, is one. The other is the Artibonite. The other is the Centre Department. Those are the departments where insecurity is high, is on the rise. We have other activities in other departments, not as much or not as difficult as these 3 are, but But our concern, just making a point here, is that in going forward, we need also to evidently reduce the criminal activity or activity by gangs in these departments. But we also need to avoid that this spreads to others, just as a separate, separate comment. Can you repeat the other points, Danica? Sorry.

Yes, no worries. I was wondering, could you repeat the percentage of the electorate that lives in these 3 departments and also double-checking that voter registry literally began today? Thank you.

Okay. The, the 50— the, the percentage is 54, 55%, um, in the, in the, in those departments that about the, the current Voter registry, no? Because also the importance of the voter registration, it's that then because of the different movements of people, the internally displaced and other movements, then it will give us a new reality, let's say, where the voters are currently.

Okay.

Okay. Now, I do have to check. I've been in the meetings since we— this morning in terms of the formal session and informal consultations and now directly here, so I haven't been able to check on the voter registration. I trust that it started. I hope that it started, but— and it was formally announced that the starting date was day. It was supposed to be the 16th, and then they just announced that it was starting Monday the 20th. So I just— I will just double-check, but I trust it did. And I'll give you the information as soon as I get it.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Very good. So if there are no additional questions, I think we will wrap up. Thank you so much for being with us. Just as a reminder, we had Carlos Ruiz Massieu, who is the head of BINU, our political mission in Haiti. He just briefed the Security Council. And thank you so much to all of us for joining us in the room and online. Thank you so much and have a good day, everyone.

Thank you.