{"id":15189,"date":"2011-10-24T12:00:41","date_gmt":"2011-10-24T11:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=15189"},"modified":"2011-10-24T02:49:51","modified_gmt":"2011-10-24T01:49:51","slug":"minustah-in-haiti-keeping-the-peace-or-conspiring-against-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2011\/10\/minustah-in-haiti-keeping-the-peace-or-conspiring-against-it\/","title":{"rendered":"MINUSTAH In Haiti: Keeping the Peace, or Conspiring Against It?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Harvard Group Publishes White Paper Reviewing \u00a0Human Rights Abuses Perpetrated by the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti; Calls for \u00a0MINUSTAH withdrawal.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

On Octo\u00adber 4th, 2011, Har\u00advard stu\u00addents as part of a group of Cana\u00addian and\u00a0US\u00a0human rights advo\u00adcates, doc\u00adtors, pub\u00adlic health experts, and jour\u00adnal\u00adists released an exten\u00adsively researched white paper review\u00ading and eval\u00adu\u00adat\u00ading the record of the United Nations Sta\u00adbi\u00adliza\u00adtion Mis\u00adsion in Haiti (known by its French acronym,MINUSTAH) and rec\u00adom\u00admend\u00ading the with\u00addrawal of the force from Haiti. The white paper release comes at a time of height\u00adened scrutiny of\u00a0MINUSTAH\u00a0due to high pro\u00adfile human rights abuses and wide\u00adspread anti\u2010MINUSTAH\u00a0sen\u00adti\u00adment in Haiti. The United Nations Secu\u00adrity Council\u2019s meet\u00ading to renew\u00a0MINUSTAH\u2019s man\u00addate for the next year is sched\u00aduled for Octo\u00adber 15th,\u00a02011.<\/p>\n

The white paper describes the his\u00adtor\u00adi\u00adcal and legal under\u00adpin\u00adnings of\u00a0MINUSTAH\u2019s man\u00addate and its polit\u00adi\u00adcal con\u00adtext, while thor\u00adoughly review\u00ading its human rights record since the 2010 earth\u00adquake. Human rights vio\u00adla\u00adtions per\u00adpe\u00adtrated by the force include sex\u00adual vio\u00adlence, vio\u00adlent responses to polit\u00adi\u00adcal protests, and the intro\u00adduc\u00adtion of cholera into Haiti fol\u00adlowed by the fail\u00adure to accept respon\u00adsi\u00adbil\u00adity or offer ade\u00adquate resources for cholera treat\u00adment, pre\u00adven\u00adtion, and com\u00adpen\u00adsa\u00adtion to vic\u00adtims\u2019 families.<\/p>\n

Beyond these direct abuses,\u00a0MINUSTAH\u00a0has also vio\u00adlated its man\u00addate through fail\u00adure to pro\u00adtect the inter\u00adnally dis\u00adplaced from forced evic\u00adtions and gender\u2010based vio\u00adlence, poor secu\u00adrity coor\u00addi\u00adna\u00adtion and lack of com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adca\u00adtion with Hait\u00adian groups, and sub\u00adver\u00adsion of demo\u00adc\u00adra\u00adtic processes by fail\u00ading to respond to sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant irreg\u00adu\u00adlar\u00adi\u00adties dur\u00ading the recent pres\u00adi\u00adden\u00adtial elections.<\/p>\n

Co\u2010author Deepa Pan\u00adchang noted, \u201cThe white paper project emerged because our Hait\u00adian part\u00adners were angry and frus\u00adtrated with\u00a0MINUSTAH\u2019s wide\u00adspread human rights vio\u00adla\u00adtions in Haiti, yet these vio\u00adla\u00adtions were not being doc\u00adu\u00admented in a sys\u00adtem\u00adatic way and\u00a0MINUSTAH\u00a0was not being held account\u00adable for them. Our goal for the white paper was to present an acces\u00adsi\u00adble and accu\u00adrate report to influ\u00adence decision\u2010making going for\u00adward.\u201d Pan\u00adchang is an alumna of the Har\u00advard School of Pub\u00adlic Health.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cholera epi\u00addemic has been an entirely man\u00admade and pre\u00adventable dis\u00adas\u00adter for\u00a0Haiti.<\/p>\n

Espe\u00adcially given the role of\u00a0MINUSTAH\u00a0in bring\u00ading this epi\u00addemic to Haiti, the sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant allo\u00adca\u00adtion of fund\u00ading toMINUSTAH\u00a0while the cholera response remains under\u00adfunded is prob\u00adlem\u00adatic to say the least,\u201d co\u2010author Rishi Rat\u00adtan of Physi\u00adcians for Haiti\u00a0added.<\/p>\n

With this in mind, the white paper seeks to shed light on the cur\u00adrent human rights abuses occur\u00adring at the hands of\u00a0MINUSTAH\u00a0and spark crit\u00adi\u00adcal debate about whether the inter\u00adna\u00adtional com\u00admu\u00adnity can con\u00adtinue to jus\u00adtify the increas\u00adingly high human cost of the mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the con\u00adtin\u00adu\u00adous stream of human rights vio\u00adla\u00adtions attrib\u00aduted to\u00a0MINUSTAH, if the inter\u00adna\u00adtional com\u00admu\u00adnity is seri\u00adous about help\u00ading Haiti they will decide that respect for Hait\u00adian sov\u00ader\u00adeignty and human rights is incom\u00adpat\u00adi\u00adble with an exten\u00adsion of the force\u2019s man\u00addate,\u201d said co\u2010author Kevin Edmonds, a doc\u00adtoral can\u00addi\u00addate at the Uni\u00adver\u00adsity of Toronto.<\/p>\n

Download the <\/strong>MINUSTAH White Paper<\/a><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 harvard.edu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Harvard Group Publishes White Paper Reviewing Human Rights Abuses Perpetrated by the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti; Calls for MINUSTAH withdrawal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latin-america-and-the-caribbean"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}