Hundreds of combatants from the US, Europe and El Salvador will reportedly be deployed to Haiti in the coming weeks to battle the country\u2019s gangs as part of a mission led by the controversial Blackwater founder and Donald Trump backer Erik Prince.<\/p>\n
According to Reuters, Prince\u2019s new security firm, Vectus Global \u2013 which has been operating in the violence-ravaged Caribbean country since March \u2013 is preparing to intensify its activities there to help authorities win key roads and territories back from heavily armed criminal groups.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne key measure of success for me will be when you can drive from Port-au-Prince to [the northern city of] Cap-Ha\u00eftien in a thin-skinned [non-armoured] vehicle and not be stopped by gangs,\u201d Prince, who said he had struck a 10-year deal with Haiti\u2019s government, told the news agency. Under the agreement, Vectus will reportedly be given a role in Haiti\u2019s tax-collection system.
\nHaiti\u2019s capital has been largely cut off from the rest of the country since February 2024, when armed groups launched a joint offensive against the government, toppling the prime minister and commandeering virtually the whole city. According to the UN, more than 1,500 people were killed between April and July, mostly in Port-au-Prince. The majority were killed during security force operations and a third in drone strikes, which the government has started using to target armed groups.<\/p>\n
A source familiar with Vectus\u2019s Haiti operations told Reuters its deployment would include snipers, intelligence and communications specialists, helicopters and boats.<\/p>\n
The use of private military contractors to fight Haitian crime groups has caused alarm among human rights advocates and observers, even if the security situation has become so dire that many Haitians have been calling for some form of foreign intervention.
\n\u201cPeople are desperate for solutions, for help, for anything \u2026 People are willing to accept things they wouldn\u2019t have been willing to accept not that long ago because of the desperation,\u201d said Jake Johnston, the author of Aid State: Elite Panic, Disaster Capitalism, and the Battle to Control Haiti. \u201cI can understand the level of trauma and desperation. But is this really a solution?\u201d Johnston asked, predicting Vectus\u2019s operation was unlikely to go well.<\/p>\n
Johnson called the deployment another example of Haitian problems being \u201coutsourced\u201d to foreigners instead of strengthening Haitian institutions such as the police. \u201cWhat kind of a message does [this use of private contractors] send to \u2026 domestic forces that are underresourced and feeling like they are not supported?\u201d<\/p>\n
Romain Le Cour, the head of the Haiti Observatory at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, called the move \u201ca severe institutional setback\u201d to Haitian police and the UN-backed security force sent there last year. Le Cour believed deploying foreign contractors would \u201cdeepen the strategic isolation\u201d of Haiti\u2019s police and the Kenya-led policing mission as they tried to regain control.<\/p>\n
Prince\u2019s group \u2013 which uses the slogan \u201cwe don\u2019t just advise, we act\u201d \u2013 has been working in Haiti since March. According to Reuters, it has been deploying drones in coordination with a taskforce led by the prime minister. \u201c[But] after six months of deployment, gangs continue to hold strategic dominance,\u201d Le Cour pointed out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hundreds of combatants from the US, Europe and El Salvador will reportedly be deployed to Haiti in the coming weeks to battle the country\u2019s gangs as part of a mission led by the controversial Blackwater founder and Donald Trump backer Erik Prince. According to Reuters, Prince\u2019s new security firm, Vectus Global \u2013 which has been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":87,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-haiti-news","category-world-news"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything.webp",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-300x200.webp",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-768x512.webp",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-1024x683.webp",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-1536x1024.webp",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything-2048x1366.webp",2048,1366,true],"audioigniter_cover":["https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/People-are-desperate-for-solutions-for-help-for-anything.webp",560,373,false]},"author_info":{"display_name":"sakpasayman","author_link":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/author\/sakpasayman\/"},"category_info":"Haiti-News<\/a> World-News<\/a>","tag_info":"World-News","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86\/revisions\/88"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiohorizon2000tci.com\/Agenor\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}