Even as France prepares to head to the polls Sunday, the Haitian crisis remains a priority

With war raging in eastern Ukraine and a bitter presidential battle under way in France, in which President Emmanuel Macron faces a tight contest with far right challenger Marine Le Pen, Haiti’s multidimensional crisis, gang violence and lack of an elected head of state and parliament could appear less important in comparison.

But given the regional implication of Haiti’s deepening crisis for Latin America and the Caribbean, countries have no other choice but to be engaged, said Michèle Ramis, director of the Americas Department in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, explaining how her nation came to host the third Haiti International

Partners Meeting just days before France’s presidential runoff this Sunday.

“For France, this [Haiti] file is of the highest priority; my president, minister of foreign affairs fully involved,” Ramis said about Macron and Minister of Foreign Affairs JeanYves Le Drianin an interview.

The involvement stems not just from the two nations’ historical ties — Haiti was once France’s richest colony before defeating its world-class army in a bloody revolution to become the world’s first Black republic — but also from the rising concerns in the international community that Haiti’s ongoing political, social, economic, humanitarian and gang crises could spill over into the region more than they already have.

Since October, the U.S. Coast Guard has interdicted more than 3,500 Haitians at sea trying to make the dangerous crossing to the U.S. Thousands of others have attempted to flee by boat to the nearby Turks and Caicos Islands and the Bahamas, and by land to the neighboring Dominican Republic in order to get to South and Central America in hopes of eventually making it to the U.S.

“It is also a crisis with a regional impact that can affect a lot of countries, including international security in the region,” Ramis said.

This is why Ramis said that along with the usual Haiti partners like the United States and Canada, France also invited other regional countries to Thursday’s discussion. Among those present were representatives of Costa Rica, Panama, Chile, Brazil and Mexico as well as the 15-member Caribbean Community known as CARICOM.

“All are well aware of the risk of the situation to be explosive,” she said. “For the region, it can also foster organized crime, and a lot of migration issues.”

In an interview with the Miami Herald, U.S. Assistant Secretary of

State Brian Nichols said the international community is committed to assisting Haiti, but Haitian leaders also must come together to find the way out of the current crisis, which is through elections. There is agreement by international partners, Nichols said, “that we need to continue to focus on security preparation for elections.”

During Thursday’s meeting, Nichols said, “there were some excellent briefings from some of the folks on the ground from the U.N. and the [Organization of American States], talking about the fact that there are people who benefit from the status quo or don’t believe that in an election, they have a chance to win a free and fair election. So the status quo benefits them.”

“So it’s incumbent upon all of us to push all the actors within the government, within civil society, within the private sector, religious organizations, toward elections and saying, ‘This is the democratic path. We have to move down this path. That is something that you owe your own people, and we are there to support you,’ ” Nichols added.

Ramis said France has been speaking with everyone involved about the Haitian crisis, but the European nation is also aware that “we cannot organize elections before we have some some sort of political consensus on the parameters, on the time frame,” and on the grounds for accepting the results of the election.

Like Nichols, she stressed the importance of the security element in order for elections to happen.

“We know ... you cannot organize elections right now because the security conditions are not net,” she said. “Haitians have to come to an agreement on the political basis for resolving this crisis.”

They also have to appoint an elections council, which while difficult is not impossible with a political agreement, she said.

“I think that Haiti’s [various] sectors see that we are interested, we are looking at them ,” she said. “This transitional period must have an end.”