Haiti has 1 million displaced people, mostly from gang violence. It’s tripled over the past year
Associated PressGENEVA — The U.N. migration agency says internal displacement in Haiti, largely caused by gang violence, has tripled over the last year and now surpasses 1 million people — a record in the Caribbean nation. “The latest data reveals that 1,041,000 people, many displaced multiple times, are struggling amidst an intensifying humanitarian crisis,” the Geneva-based agency said in a statement. Agency spokesman Kennedy Okoth told a U.N. briefing in Geneva that the forced return of around 200,000 people — mostly from neighboring Dominican Republic — to Haiti over the last year had worsened the crisis. But he said that “deportation or any forced returns to countries that are already facing mounting security and humanitarian challenges is not something that is going to be beneficial to the group.” As Haiti continues to struggle with a surge in gang violence, the government on Tuesday swore in Mario Andrésol as the new state secretary of public security.