Gang violence is surging to unprecedented levels in Haiti, UN envoy says

PORT-AU-PRINCE (AP) — An unprecedented surge in gang violence is plaguing Haiti, with the number of victims killed, injured and kidnapped more than doubling last year, the U.N. special envoy for the conflict-wracked Caribbean nations said Thursday.

Some 300 gangs control an estimated 80% of the capital, and accounted for 83% of last year’s killings and injuries, Salvador said. But, she added, their tentacles have reached northward into the Artibonite region, considered Haiti’s food basket, and south of the capital “gangs conducted large-scale attacks to control key zones,” systematically using sexual violence to exert control. The briefing came more than three months after the Security Council approved the deployment of a multinational armed force led by Kenya to help bring gang violence under control. 

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