Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a series of conversations with Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry pressuring him to resign. Henry rose to power with the Biden administration’s support after the former leader was assassinated in 2021. As Prime Minister, Henry has lost control over most of the capital city to opposition groups and criminal gangs.
The Miami Herald reports, “Blinken pressed Haiti’s prime minister, Ariel Henry, to announce his resignation and a political transition in a series of phone calls that took place Thursday and were described as ‘tense.’”
After President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in July 2021, the White House worked to push Henry into power. Under his term in office, the Haitian government has increasingly lost control over Port-au-Prince.
The Biden administration attempted to prop up the Henry government by establishing an armed international force to deploy to Haiti with UN Security Council approval. In October, the body approved the US plan for Kenya to lead an armed international “police” force in Haiti.
However, the White House’s plan has faced considerable opposition in Haiti and Kenya. The Kenyan opposition leader sued President William Ruto at the country’s high court to block the proposal.
In January, the top court in Nairobi ruled in favor of the opposition, blocking the deployment. Last week, Ruto and Henry inked an agreement paving the way for the Kenya-led armed deployment to move forward.
While Henry was in Kenya signing the agreement, opposition groups in Port-au-Prince carried out a series of attacks on prisons and the main airport. After leaving to meet with international partners and ink the agreement with Ruto, Henry has been unable to return to Haiti.
In response, Washington is considering sending an elite Marine unit to the US embassy in Port-au-Prince. A State Department statement described the situation in Haiti as “untenable.”
“For more than a year, the United States has encouraged Prime Minister Henry and other key stakeholders in Haiti to reach a compromise that will end the ongoing political stalemate,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said. “In the past week, the political crisis in Haiti, combined with escalating violence and civil unrest, has created an untenable situation which threatens the country’s citizens and security.”
It is unclear if Henry plans to listen to Washington’s requests, or if he has the ability to hold onto power without US support. Also, there is a question of what the Kenyan force in Haiti would do without a standing government to support.
Kyle Anzalone is the opinion editor of Antiwar.com, news editor of the Libertarian Institute, and co-host of Conflicts of Interest.
FJB
I call for Joe Biden to resign. The situation in the nation, and in the world at large, is untenable.
Yes, far worse than Trump, and Trump sucks too. One of the worst presidents in my lifetime, which considering that the list includes Reagan, Cheney, Clinton, and Obama, is saying a lot.
So will it be good for the country if he steps down or should we continue supporting the very President the people dont want?
Here’s a better question; what solution is Putin recommending?
Im sure the Pro Russia team here will soon let us know and i m convinced it will be the opposite of whatever the US proposes even if it’s a good initiative.
It’s the anti American way.
Is it ever possible for the Yankee Empire to mind its own business, and not try to weigh in in favor, or against, some regime? As we are further mired in a decaying empire, that empire meddles in the politics of every nation, including that of the host nation.
As for “a good initiative”, the question becomes: good for who?
No, that’s not what empires do. The U.S. wants it all, and will continue to try to take over the whole planet until it does so or collapses, the latter being far more likely.
On the other hand, it’s not really the U.S., because countries basically exist in name only. It’s the global ruling class, and it couldn’t care less which country. https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechnetwork4.html
Haiti needs our help because we didn’t help them enough. Here’s what happened the last 10 times we helped them: https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22902512
Here we go again.
If US doesn’t help it gets criticized.
If it does help, well, it was not enough.
Hard to keep US haters satisfied.
Ask Putin to go help. It’ll be problem solved in no time. 🤣
Globalist warmongers like you will never be satisfied until we have conquered both Eurasia and Eastasia and your Flag is flown all over the world and your UN is controlled BIPARTISANLY by YOUR Government
Not sure how you arrived to that conclusion but, go knock yourself out.
Are you kidding? The U.S. doesn’t help anyone. They invade, kill, destroy, steal, and bully. Are you that clueless, or just another lying propagandist?
To be clear, the U.S. helps some elites in other countries, but that’s about it. And even then, when the U.S. is done with those elites, it turns its back on them (not that I care about that).
Here we go again – the big bully telling other nations’ leaders to resign. Maybe Haiti should tell Biden to resign?
At least is not invading and annexing like the dumbass you support.
Hypocrite.
Look in your broken mirror
Fool
Haiti should demand reparations from France & the U.S. for slavery. As it stands now, it’s the opposite, with Haiti being forced to pay France for not continuing to provide the latter with slaves.
Every stinking time we go there to “help” things are made worse.
Send Russia to liberate and annex it.
For sure it’ll be better.
US Gov and its Wolf State Dept and Dragon CIA helped install autocracies for decades all over the world…then starting in with the fall of Vietnam in 1975 one by won the same crowd helped bring down the various countries all over the world that they had installed. El Salvador, Nicaragua, Chile, Angola, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq….and installed and propped up these hellholes with dollars, machines and propaganda.
Intervention, chaos and now NEW “leaders” created and managed by our CIA and Govt…great.
This time Wash. won’t have to destroy the country in order to save it. It’s already destroyed, but that won’t stop throwing away more money and sending in troops. Always ask ‘who benefits’ and follow the money.
LATEST NEWS FROM HAITI:
Haitians shot dead in street and there’s no one to take the corpses away
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/09/haiti-corpses-gangs/
Port-au-Prince reached a high of 92 degrees on Friday. The smell of decaying corpses, human rights activists say, has driven some people from their homes. Others have taken it upon themselves to move or burn the bodies. Because who else will?
Even before the past week, public services in the city were sharply limited.
Trash piled up in its slums; cholera had resurfaced. The gangs
terrorized the population with systematic rape, indiscriminate kidnapping and mass killing, all with impunity.
Just a color revolution away from freedumb and autocracy……
Color revolutions started with corrupt criminal Hillary Clinton and now continues under the Joey Biden fascists.
The first major successful color revolutions — Gerogria, Ukraine, and Krgyzstan — took place when George W. Bush was president and ineffectual junior US Senator Hillary Clinton had precisely zero influence over US foreign policy.
You mean Dick Cheney. Bush was just a figurehead. Cheney rain foreign policy in that administration.
Pay attention when Greenwald mentions that Victoria Nuland was an advisor to Dick Cheney.
The American uni-party under the National Endowment for Democracy experimented with overthrowing governments under village idiot George W Bush, but Hillary Clinton brought mafia like tactics to the effort.
Another General Manuel Noriega scenario…!
Damn white people, just can’t get over losing their slave country. The U.S. and France hold onto this like rabid dogs. U.S. empire must be ended!
The USA goons no doubt assassinated the previous Haitian leader when he refused to go along with the Scamdemic.
Now they are unhappy with their puppet that he is not compliant enough.