Canada’s new envoy to Haiti faces gangs, political impasse

Canada’s new ambassador in Port-au-prince is no stranger to Haiti’s vexing challenges. But a lot has changed — and much hasn’t — since André François Giroux worked to coordinate his country’s efforts at the United Nations to help train the Haitian police back in the late 1990s.

Today, the job goes beyond reading files or U.N. reports from a remote location, and involves making the rounds through Port-auprinces’s gang-ridden streets while trying to decipher fact from fiction in a country where things are not always as they seem.

Giroux, who recently arrived in Port-au-prince after being appointed as Canada’s new ambassador to Haiti in September, says he’s up for the challenge. So far, he has no regrets about giving up a posh posting in Australia, where he still had a year left as consul general, for the troubled Caribbean nation that Canadian citizens are urged to avoid due to threat posed by kidnappings, gang violence and the potential for civil unrest.

“I’m thrilled and honored and very humbled by the opportunity,” said Giroux, adding that while Haiti is a major source of Canadian aid, Ottawa has spent the last three decades “really trying to help in moving” Haiti forward.

“But you know, the situation has always been complicated,” he said. “Canada definitely has been stepping up to the plate. It’s a very important relationship for us. And, I just love a challenge.”

Giroux replaces Ambassador Sébastien Carrière, who left in August after his two-year posting ended.

Like his predecessor, Giroux will be tasked with steering Canada’s foreign policy amid an ongoing Haitian political impasse that still has not provided a clear path for holding long overdue elections, and dealing with widespread gang violence. The violence, which has been escalating in recent months, has turned most of the capital into a no-go zone as heavily armed gangs target schools and hospitals, pillage police stations and entire neighborhoods, and rape and kidnap with impunity.

He must also balance what at times is a fraught relationship between his government and Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who has led the country since the July 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, and groups that want him out.

“I’ve been doing a lot of … listening to the views from all segments of society since I’ve arrived here,” Giroux said. “You sometimes leave the room thinking, ‘Where is the area of agreement here?’ Because some of the positions are so opposite.”

As Haiti’s violence continues to spiral out of control, Canada has tried to carve out its own identity in respect to its foreign policy toward the country.

While many Haitians have long held the belief that Canada takes its policy cues from Washington, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been challenging that notion as he rebuffed U.S. pressure to put boots on the ground in Haiti.

In various public forums, Trudeau has highlighted the fact that Canada is imposing sanctions — 28 to date — against members of Haiti’s political and economic elite whom his Liberal government believes are contributing to the gang violence, while the United States is lagging in its blacklisting.

Despite such sanctions, gang violence continues to escalate. Last week a gang alliance in the country’s largest slum, Cité Soleil, fired its assault weapons at a hospital where a baby died before being delivered and babies on oxygen had to be evacuated in a hail of flying bullets.