Kenya deploys additional 144 police to Haiti

Earlier in the week President Donald Trump's administration said it had frozen financial contributions to the mission, but the State Department said Wednesday it was maintaining most of the aid.

Kenya's interior ministry confirmed to AFP that 144 officers had been deployed Tuesday morning, bringing the total number in the country to more than 700.

The Kenyan-led Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS), under United Nations auspices, has been in Haiti since 2023.

However, the mission has been plagued by problems, with the UN chief saying at the beginning of the year that more aid was needed for it to be effective.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned in January the mission is "still not deployed to full strength," limiting its capacity to support the national police.

Fewer than 800 of the 2,500 police officers hoped for have been deployed.

Haiti has no president or parliament and is ruled by a transitional body, which is struggling to manage extreme violence linked to criminal gangs, poverty and other challenges.

More than 5,600 people were killed in Haiti last year as a result of gang violence, about a thousand more than in 2023, the UN said.

More than a million Haitians were forced to flee their homes, three times as many as the year before.