Kenyan President William Ruto vowed yesterday that his country’s upcoming deployment to Haiti will seek to crush gangs that have ravaged the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country.
Ruto was speaking on a state visit to Washington alongside President Joe Biden, who saluted Kenya’s willingness to assist and promised that the United States would provide intelligence and equipment in hopes of stabilising its troubled southern neighbour.
“Gangs and criminals do not have status. They have no religion,” Ruto told a White House news conference.
He vowed that the international mission would “deal with them firmly, decisively, within the perimeters of the law”.
Kenya and the other nations set to deploy to Haiti aim to “secure that country and to break the back of the gangs and the criminals that have visited untold suffering in that country”, Ruto said.
Asked if the Kenyan deployment can succeed in defeating gangs that have plunged Haiti into near anarchy, Biden said: “Yes.”
“This is a crisis. It’s able to be dealt with,” Biden said, praising Kenya’s “first-rate capability”.
The Biden administration had searched extensively for a country to take the lead but had ruled out sending in US forces, who have a long history of intervention in Haiti.
“We’re in a situation where we want to do all we can without us looking like America, once again, is stepping over and deciding this is what must be done,” Biden said. “Haitians are looking for help, as well as the folks in the Caribbean are looking for help.”
Ruto said that the deployment was a decision by Kenya, not the United States, as his country wanted to advance “peace and stability as a responsible global citizen”.
In 2021 Biden withdrew the last US troops from Afghanistan, ending America’s longest war, and has promised to avoid putting US forces at risk overseas.
Meanwhile, the deployment of the first Kenyan police officers to Haiti to lead an international anti-gang force has been delayed after a planned flight from Nairobi was postponed on Tuesday, two sources briefed on the matter told Reuters.
US officials had previously indicated that the officers would be in Port-au-Prince yesterday to coincide with Kenyan President Ruto’s state visit to the White House.
Kenya volunteered in July to lead the mission but has faced repeated delays deploying due to litigation brought by opponents of the government’s plan and a surge of violence in March that led the Haitian prime minister to resign.
The mission, which will comprise up to 2,500 personnel, is intended to counter gangs who control most of Port-au-Prince and have carried out widespread killings, kidnappings and sexual violence.
Kenya has committed 1,000 police officers to the UN-approved mission, most of which is being financed by the United States.
Two hundred Kenyan officers assigned to the mission were told they would fly out of Nairobi on Tuesday evening, the two sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.
One source, a former police officer in contact with members of the mission, said the officers were given no explanation for the last-minute delay and were told to remain on standby.
The other source, who was briefed by a government official, said conditions were not in place in Port-au-Prince to receive the officers.
Kenya’s government spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
