One of Haiti's leaders says his country is at war with gangs and asks
the world for help
[September 26, 2025]
By CRISTIANA MESQUITA and DÁNICA COTO
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — One of Haiti’s leaders on Thursday asked
the world to help his troubled Caribbean country fight what he
characterized as a war against relentless gang violence and widespread
hunger.
Laurent Saint-Cyr, head of Haiti’s transitional presidential council,
addressed the U.N. General Assembly in New York, saying that immediate
action was needed because people were dying daily across Haiti.
“Just a four-hour plane ride from here, a human tragedy is unfolding,”
he said. “Every day, innocent lives are extinguished. ... Entire
neighborhoods are disappearing.”'
“It’s important to say this: Haiti is experiencing war, a war between
criminals that want to impose violence as a social order and an armed
population that is fighting for human dignity and freedom," Saint-Cyr
said.
Violence between the country's gangs and police, as well as with
vigilante groups, has left more than 3,100 people dead from January to
June, with another 1,189 injured, according to the U.N.
The mayhem has displaced more than 1.3 million people across Haiti in
recent years, while more than half of Haiti’s nearly 12 million
inhabitants were expected to experience severe hunger through through
the first half of the year.
The refugees settle where they can, such as the shelter found by Kettia
Jean Charles and her family in the Delmas 31 low-income area of the
capital, Port-au-Prince. No longer as safe as it once was, it's still a
refuge compared to the Solino neighborhood where she ran a beauty salon
— now a ghost town after gangsters drove out most remaining locals in
November.
“I used to sleep in a bed, had my own business, and my children went to
school. Now, I am living this catastrophic life,” Charles said.
Charles, 34, is at least seven months pregnant — she's not sure exactly
how many weeks — and lives with her husband and three children in a home
made of four plastic sheets with a tarp for a roof. She gets some help
from relatives nearby and the family fights for the scraps of food
provided at the shelter.
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Haiti President Franck Laurent Saint Cyr addresses the 80th session
of the United Nations General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025.
(AP Photo/Richard Drew)
“I am asking for help so I can get out of this situation,” Charles
said as she wiped away tears. “Since I have come here, it has been
very humiliating because I have no money, so I have to beg.”
Last year, a U.N.-backed mission led by Kenyan police officers
launched operations in Haiti meant to help an understaffed and
underfunded local police department fight back against the gangs.
But more than a year has passed, and the mission still has less than
1,000 personnel, far below the 2,500 envisioned, and some $112
million in its trust fund — about 14% of the estimated $800 million
needed a year.
The U.S. and Panama have urged the U.N. Security Council to
authorize a new force of 5,550 in Haiti, a proposal backed by
Saint-Cyr.
“It is crucial to mobilize a strong force with a clear mandate and
with adequate material, logistical and financial resources," he
said.
In the once-thriving neighborhood of Solino, which had several
shops, businesses and even a health clinic, the gangs took
everything they could, including electrical wiring, toilets and
light fixtures. Nearly every home now has charred and bullet-riddled
walls.
“All I dream about now is leaving this camp so that my children can
go to school and contribute to society,” Charles said.
___
Coto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Associated Press
videographer Pierre-Richard Luxama in Port-au-Prince, Haiti,
contributed.
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