Overview:
Haitian American veterans are being tapped by Erik Prince, the founding father of Blackwater, to function paid mercenaries in a covert effort to suppress Haiti’s gangs, elevating questions on sovereignty, oversight, and diaspora involvement.
Haitian American navy veterans are being recruited by Erik Prince, founding father of the controversial non-public navy agency Blackwater, to function paid mercenaries in Haiti this summer time, in response to a brand new report by The New York Times. The hassle is a part of a contract Prince has signed with Haiti’s transitional authorities to assist suppress gang violence in and round Port-au-Prince.
The recruitment plan, first reported by The New York Occasions, includes sourcing as many as 150 international fighters, together with U.S.-trained Haitian Individuals, to function beneath Prince’s management. The deployment is predicted to incorporate helicopters, weapon shipments, and drone-assisted assaults on gang territory.
One of many veterans approached was Rodenay Joseph, a United States Military veteran, who supplies safety coaching and is working for U.S. Congress, District 20 in Florida, difficult incumbent Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick.
Joseph, who says he’s been involved with the Haitian authorities concerning the nation’s safety disaster, urged them to work with Haitian safety contractors who’ve the technical experience and cultural context to work successfully in Haiti.
“Now we have the data. Now we have the expertise. We are able to do it,” he stated in an interview with The Haitian Occasions Wednesday night. Joseph is in opposition to Prince’s involvement in Haiti’s affairs. “We are able to remedy the difficulty with Haitian-led efforts.”
Joseph confirmed to The Haitian Occasions that Prince contacted him instantly in search of the names of Haitian American veterans to assist “provide personnel for contract since late final 12 months.”
“We must be very frightened, as a result of if he’s from the U.S. authorities, not less than he can have the illusion of getting to reply to Congress,” he stated to The New York Occasions. “If it’s him, his contract, he doesn’t owe anyone an evidence.”
“It’s simply one other payday.”
Including that Prince deliberate on sending “non-public troopers from El Salvador to Haiti.”
If we’re going to work with the U.S., we must always accomplice with them on logistics and intelligence, Joseph stated in his interview with The Haitian Occasions.
“In addition to that, that is Haiti-led,” he stated.
Who’s Erik Prince?
Erik Prince is a former U.S. Navy SEAL greatest identified for founding Blackwater Worldwide, a U.S.-based safety agency that exploded in notoriety after a 2007 massacre in Baghdad the place Blackwater contractors killed 17 Iraqi civilians. The killings led to a number of convictions and, later, presidential pardons by Donald Trump in 2020. He’s additionally the brother of Betsy DeVos, the training secretary throughout Trump’s first time period, who resigned after the January sixth assaults on the Capitol in 2021.
Since Blackwater dissolved and was rebranded as Constellis, Prince has continued to run non-public navy ventures in battle zones, together with Libya, Afghanistan, and now Haiti.
What has Prince been employed to do?
In keeping with The New York Occasions and Joseph, nonetheless, the duties might embody offering safety on the nation’s ports and customs operations along with dismantling gangs.
“This man goes to make Haiti his own residence,” Joseph stated. “This man goes to have [or] signal a contract for 20 to 25 years, and he’s going to take a very long time. That may by no means be paid to me.
“That’s my concern,” he added.
A duplicate of a contract Prince reportedly signed with Haiti’s authorities has but to be seen, which is an everyday prevalence within the nation.
One contract that does seem in U.S. authorities data reviewed by The Haitian Occasions exhibits that Alix Didier Fils-Aimé, Haiti’s prime minister, signed a contract on Feb. 7 with a Washington, D.C. lobbying agency, Continental Technique. The agency is to supply “authorities relations providers” for a 12 months at a $35,000 month-to-month retainer.
Haiti’s historical past with mercenaries
Since March, Prince’s groups have operated armed drones in Haiti aimed toward killing gang leaders.
That very same month, The Haitian Occasions reported on a Haitian Nationwide Police (PNH) operation within the Delmas 6 neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, which resulted within the deaths of a number of gang members, Fils-Aimé had introduced on X.
On the time, rumors circulated that Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier might have been shot and probably killed within the operation. A video of Chérizier later surfaced that night, refuting the rumors of his demise.
Haiti’s relationship with non-public navy contractors stretches again many years. U.S. companies supplied safety in the course of the 1994 return of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. However in recent times, the outcomes have been much more controversial, particularly after Colombian mercenaries, employed by way of a U.S.-based agency, have been implicated within the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.
Greater than one million individuals have been displaced from Port-au-Prince since Moïse’s assassination because of gang violence.
Macollvie J. Neel contributed to this reporting.