News
Haiti: UN reduces peacekeeping force – extends mission for 1 more year amid cholera controversy
(AFP) – The UN Security Council on Thursday voted to reduce the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti which is battling a mounting controversy over a cholera epidemic. However, the Security Council also voted unanimously to extend the mission until mid-October 2014.
One day after a lawsuit against the United Nations was filed in court on behalf of victims, the Security Council urged the UN to support government efforts to battle the epidemic.
The cholera epidemic has killed more than 8,300 people since it started in October 2010 and made more than 679,000 sick. It has been traced to a river next to a UN camp where Nepalese troops were based.
A Security Council resolution which extended the mandate of the UN mission in Haiti, MINUSTAH, noted government efforts to “control and eliminate” the epidemic.
It urged “United Nations entities in coordination with other relevant actors to continue to support the government of Haiti in addressing the “structural weaknesses” in the Caribbean nation.
The Security Council reduced the maximum size of MINUSTAH to 5,021 troops, down from 6,233, and 2,601 police to 2,457. The reduction is part of a general campaign to cut UN forces where the security threat has fallen away.
