Haiti’s instability should be high on Summit of the Americas agenda, Rubio urges
Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio is urging the Biden administration to make Haiti’s ongoing crisis, which is helping to fuel a wave of migration throughout the region and at sea, a focus during next month’s Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles.
“Without stability in Haiti, it has an impact on multiple countries,” Rubio said during a hearing in the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere on Thursday about the upcoming summit. “Even Cuba is now intercepting Haitian migrants.”
Haiti’s Interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry is among several hemispheric leaders who have been invited to the June 6 summit, which is being hosted by the United States for the first time since its inaugural launch in Miami in 1994. The issue of migration is among the focal points of the discussions as thousands of Haitians, Cubans, Venezuelans and Central Americans continue to transit through Central America to cross the U.S. border with Mexico.
At the same time, there has been a surge in Haitian and Cuba migrant crossings at sea, while nearly 800 Haitians have also made it to the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico by crossing the treacherous Mona Passage that separates the island and Hispaniola. The U.S. Coast Guard has already stopped more than 5,000 Haitians at sea since Oct. 1. On Wednesday, a Florida Keys-bound Haitian freighter with 800 Haitians aboard ran aground in Cuban waters after it began taking on water.
“It’s really important that [Haiti] be a topic that’s highlighted and focused upon, because I do think there are countries in the region that have a vested interest, beginning with the Dominican Republic that obviously shares Hispaniola with them, but others that have a vested interest in contributing towards some level of governmental stability there and security, so that that can then be built upon to hopefully provide a better [future],” Rubio said. ‘I just hope that the topic of Haiti is prominently featured on the agenda and it’s something that we really confront.”
Henry’s invitation to the summit was confirmed Thursday by Kevin O’Reilly, the summit’s national coordinator who appeared at the Senate hearing.
Just weeks away, the June 6 gathering has been overshadowed by threats of a boycott by U.S. allies in the region due to the likely exclusion of the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.
That decision has been criticized by leaders like Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who has said he would not attend unless all leaders in the Americas are invited to Los Angeles, and members of the 15-member Caribbean Community known as Caricom, of which Haiti is a member.
In the case of Henry, the question for some Haitians and critics of his government was not whether he would boycott the summit but whether he would get an invitation to attend.
Now that he has, some critics say he is not legally entitled to go without the presence of the president of the Republic of Haiti, which the crisis-wracked Caribbean nation currently doesn’t have. A neurosurgeon, Henry was tapped by Haitian President Jovenel Moïse weeks before his slaying to run the government, but wasn’t officially installed until after Moïse’s July 7 assassination in his bedroom in the hills above the Haitian capital.
Since then, Henry and his weak interim government have been the target of criticism by members of civil society and advocates seeking to take the reins of power and lead a transition in Haiti, where there also is no functioning parliament or locally elected leaders.
The government is accused of being “indifferent” toward the atrocities carried out by armed gangs, whose violent clashes late last month led to the forced displacement of more than 9,000 Haitians from neighborhoods east of Port-au-Prince and the deaths of at least 148 people, according to a local human rights group.
In recent days, gang-orchestrated kidnappings have led to the abductions of three doctors, a schoolgirl, a Catholic priest and a United Nations employee in Port-au-Prince. The kidnappings, along with the country’s shattered economy and deepening social and political unrest, are all helping fuel a deadly tide in migration at sea.
During Thursday’s Senate hearing Rubio expressed “deep concerns about Haiti” and noted that there’s not a lot of clarity about “what happens if, God forbid,” Henry is overthrown. “We’re hoping that doesn’t happen,” he said.
“I imagine the topic of Haiti, its future, its direction, how it goes from here on out, is something that will be on the summit agenda?” he asked O’Reilly. “Is that something we’re proactively raising?”
“We are very much engaged, as part of the broad sweep of our diplomacy in the hemisphere, on just that agenda, sir,” O’Reilly said.
This story was originally published May 27, 2022 at 10:13 AM.
