Jamaica is ready to send soldiers, police to re-establish order in Haiti

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Jamaica’s prime minister said his government is willing to send soldiers and police officers to Haiti as part of a proposed multinational security assistance deployment.

The announcement comes a week after U.N. special envoy for Haiti Helen La Lime said she hoped that the U.N. Security Council would deal “positively” with the pending request from Haiti’s government for international armed forces despite the U.S. and Canada showing no interest.

Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness told the island’s House of

Representatives on Tuesday that he wants to help Haiti and “support a return to a reasonable level of stability and peace, which would be necessary for any inclusive, democratic process to take root.”

The announcement appears to mark the first time that a nation in the Western Hemisphere publicly offers boots on the ground after Haiti’s prime minister and other top officials requested the immediate deployment of foreign troops in early October amid a crippling fuel siege blamed on the country’s most powerful gang.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres and La Lime have backed Haiti’s plea to no avail.

The U.N. Security

Council has mulled the request but taken no action, opting instead to issue sanctions on people including Jimmy Chérizier, a dominant gang leader and former police officer blamed for masterminding multiple massacres.

“It is our impression that the international community has not yet taken stock of the urgency of the situation that the Haitian people are facing,” Léon Charles, former chief of Haiti’s National Police, said Wednesday during an Organization of American States meeting.

“My country is experiencing one of the most difficult moments in its history,” said Charles, who is Haiti’s permanent representative to the OAS.