Haiti is proudly represented in the official video of the 2018 FIFA World Cup
Last Thursday: Jason Derulo released the music video for his track "Colors" which is the anthem for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The video proudly begins with aerial views of The Citadelle Laferriére, and continues with countless images of Haitian dancers, the Haitian flag and a special cameo of Wyclef Jean.
The new clip was a double homecoming for Derulo as it was filmed at The Citadelle Laferriére (a mountaintop fortress located in the north of his homeland of Haiti) and Miami, the city where he was raised.
Jason had this to say, "As the lyrics say, 'There's beauty in the unity we've found.' We're inundated everyday with negative news and it's hard to remain positive. That's why it's more important than ever to unite with people in your community to try and make a difference.
"As a Haitian-American, I've become more and more invested in giving back to where my family is from. To that extent, this song is a bit of a launch of plans that I am excited to reveal soon..."
It is now confirmed that the visit made in Haiti last March by the Coca Cola spokesperson within the framework of shooting clips of the official song of the 2018 World Cup 2018, was not a decoy. Throughout the 3 minutes 49 second video, filled with colors, performances, and flags - in sign of a celebration of the diversity-, the audience gets a unique opportunity to discover the Citadelle – a masterpiece built by King Henry Christophe.
The Haitian flag is also featured prominently in the video. Jason Derulo raises proudly while he pronounces the words: "Show your true colors - show your real colors," as if to claim his real Haitian origins.
Acting Secretary Sullivan’s Meeting With Haitian President Jovenel Moise
Acting Secretary of State John J. Sullivan met with Haitian President Jovenel Moise on April 13, 2018 on the margins of the Summit of the Americas in Lima, Peru to discuss security and economic growth in Haiti, as well as democracy in the region.
Acting Secretary Sullivan thanked President Moise for his leadership as Chairman of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and urged consensus within the organization to promote and defend democracy. The Acting Secretary and President Moise also discussed the importance of continued support for the Haitian National Police.
The two leaders agreed that Haiti and its partners should increase efforts to improve the investment climate in Haiti to create jobs for Haitians and increase economic prosperity.
Haiti launches campaign to vaccinate over 2 million children against diphtheria, with PAHO support
REPORT
from Pan American Health Organization
Published on 03 Apr 2018
Port-au-Prince, 10 April 2018 (PAHO/WHO) - In the coming weeks, more than 2.3 million Haitian children between the ages of 1 and 14 are expected to be vaccinated against diphtheria, a bacterial infection that causes throat inflammation and difficulty breathing and that in severe cases can lead to death.
The diphtheria vaccination campaign was launched in mid March by Haiti’s Ministry of Public Health and Population (MSPP) with support from the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO), UNICEF and other partners.In this first phase, campaign activities are focused on 27 communes in eight departments (Artibonite, Center, Nippes, Nord, Nord-Est, Nord-Ouest, Sud and Sud-Est). According to a preliminary report, around 1 million children ages 1 to 14 were vaccinated.
On April 8, a similar campaign is slated to begin in Haiti’s Ouest department, the most populated in the country, and will seek to reach more than 1.2 million children ages 1 to 14.
“The ministry has decided to conduct a campaign in 40 communes where diphtheria has been confirmed or is suspected,” said Laurent Adriane, MSPP Director General. “Making vaccines available is the goal of the Ministry of Health and its main partners, such as PAHO/WHO and UNICEF.”
Since the beginning of this year, Haiti has reported 14 confirmed cases of diphtheria and 48 probable cases. Children under 15 are the most affected, and nearly half of the confirmed and probable cases were not vaccinated. During this period there have been six deaths among the probable cases and one among the confirmed cases.
“This vaccination campaign seeks to reach all those children who have not received the essential vaccines to be protected against diphtheria,” said PAHO/WHO Representative in Haiti Luis Codina. “This is also the largest preventive vaccination campaign in the country since 2016, when similar efforts were made towards the elimination of measles and rubella.”
PAHO/WHO is collaborating with Haiti in the response to the diphtheria outbreak with technical and financial support of the operational costs of the vaccination campaign.Vaccines against diphtheria and immunization supplies are being acquired through the PAHO Revolving Fund, a pooled procurement mechanism that allows countries in the region to purchase vaccines at affordable prices. Support is also being provided for purchases of diphtheria antitoxin to treat cases, and antibiotics for cases and contacts.
To carry out this campaign, more than 6,300 vaccinators have been mobilized, organized in 3,181 vaccination teams. They were trained by departmental and national supervisors, with the support of PAHO/WHO experts. Local supervision and independent monitoring of vaccination coverage will take place during and after the campaign) to ensure the technical quality of the campaign.
US joins the Haitian National Police to open the police substation in Diegue
April 13, 2018 -- The community of Diegue gathered today to open a new police sub-station, financed with the support of the U.S. Embassy’s Office of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. U.S. Ambassador Sison shared, “I am proud to celebrate with Diegue as you build a strong and safe community,” emphasizing the importance of security and community policing to the ability of communities to prosper economically.
Senator Antonio Cheramy, Haitian National Police West Department Director Berson Soljour, Commissaire Jean Gospel, the Mairie of Petionville, CASEC, ADIPOD, and many others from the Diegue community attended the event. The new police sub-station will host ten police officers assigned to the community. This new facility cost $105,400 to construct and is located on property donated by the local community.
The United States has provided more than $250 million in assistance to the HNP since 2010. This includes more than $60 million in infrastructure projects in Port-au-Prince such as the Vivy Michel, Martissant, Habitation Leclerc, Grand Ravine, Cite Soleil, and refurbishment of the Portail Leogane Commissariat. U.S. support to the Haitian National Police extends beyond construction projects, however. American police experts support with technical training and assistance to fight drug trafficking, support community policing, support correctional services, and work with the principal directors of the police towards the goal of strengthening administrative and management systems.
The United States has been an important partner of the Haitian National Police for over 20 years.
New Mission in Haiti Preparing Transition from Peacekeeping to Development Role, Under-Secretary-General Tells Security Council Ahead of Mandate Renewal
REPORT
With the United Nations Mission for Justice Support in Haiti (MINUJUSTH) fully operational, preparations have already begun for that follow-up peacekeeping operation to make way for a new United Nations presence by the end of 2019 that would focus on the Caribbean nation’s long-term sustainable development, the Organization’s top peacekeeping official told the Security Council today.
Jean-Pierre Lacroix, Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, introduced the Secretary-General’s latest report on the Mission ahead of its decision on renewing its current mandate, which expires on 15 April. Included in that document was a list of 11 benchmarks for an exit strategy for MINUJUSTH, which the Council established through resolution 2350 (2017) as a successor to the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH).
Briefing the Council, he reviewed the progress the Mission had made so far in fulfilling its mandate to assist the Government of Haiti to strengthen rule of law institutions, to support and develop the Haitian National Police, and to carry out human rights monitoring, reporting and analysis.
“While achieving results should remain our common priority, we have already started to prepare for a transition to a non-peacekeeping presence, based on lessons learned in Haiti and in other contexts,” he said, explaining that a transition strategy was being drawn up — in consultation with the Government — that would build on existing United Nations-wide instruments, such as the United Nations Development Assistance Framework.
He said he was strongly encouraged by the willingness of and efforts by Haitian President Jovenel Moïse and his Government to create a climate for change. In that regard, he welcomed the President’s priorities on State reform and the maintenance of political and social stability, adding that the United Nations stood ready to support the Government in devising a clear road map for reforms, taking into account the Mission’s capacities on the ground.
“We have many reasons to be optimistic that this path to progress is irreversible, while we need to jointly — Haiti, the United Nations, international and regional partners — continue investing in the success of the country and United Nations engagement in it,” he said.
In the ensuing discussion, Haiti’s representative said his was a country of peace, with democracy being consolidated, institutions established under the Constitution functioning in a regular manner and human rights being respected and upheld. He reported progress in such areas as security, good governance and respect for the rule of law, and underscored a significant drop in violent crime. That said, he acknowledged that the Government was fully aware of progress yet to be made, having inherited the consequences of decades of neglect, structural handicaps and bottlenecks that would have to be tackled over the long term.
He said his Government had taken note of the Secretary-General’s withdrawal strategy for the Mission, but emphasized that nothing would be possible without scrupulous adherence to reciprocal obligations and a genuine spirit of solidarity, mutual respect and trust. He added that Haiti welcomed the Secretary-General’s initiative on cholera, although the $7.7 million raised so far for the United Nations Haiti Cholera Response Multi-Partner Trust Fund was woefully insufficient, and called for goodwill and predictable funding to ensure just compensation to cholera victims, their loved ones and others.
Canada’s representative, speaking on behalf of the Group of Friends of Haiti, said structural reforms must address such challenges as prolonged pretrial detention and prison overcrowding, sexual and gender-based violence, greater women’s participation in decision-making, reforming and strengthening of the justice sector and enhancing social services. The Group welcomed steps taken by the Haitian Government towards greater security, stability and prosperity, and recommended that the Council extend the Mission’s mandate for another year with no changes to its level of resources.
The representative of the United States said Haitians themselves were taking the lead when it came to security and law enforcement. When peacekeeping worked well, countries could develop their own capacities to protect their citizens and put in place their own political processes. Welcoming the benchmarked exit strategy for MINUJUSTH, she said the United States was a long-standing friend and partner of Haiti — one that would continue to support its security priorities as well as its political and democratic development.
Chile’s representative was among several non-Council members from Latin America to take the floor, saying the international community should not lose sight of what had been achieved. The Mission could only consolidate progress made by closely cooperating with all national actors and through the active involvement of the international community, she said. Welcoming a significant reduction in cholera transmissions and fatalities, she applauded consultations with civil society, local leaders and cholera victims with a view towards addressing the scourge.
Also speaking this morning were representatives of Bolivia, Netherlands, Equatorial Guinea, Poland, Ethiopia, Côte d’Ivoire, Kuwait, China, United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Russian Federation, Kazakhstan, Peru, Argentina, Brazil and Colombia, as well as the European Union.
How Haiti is Making Some of the Best Rum on Earth
Rum culture may be a mainstay throughout the Caribbean, but one of the most overlooked countries in spirits, Haiti, is making a sugarcane spirit called clairin that's unlike any rum you’ve tasted.
Many people still view rum through the lens of the dark, rich and sweet offerings of decades past. But clairin, a traditional rum made in Haiti, showcases the spirit in its most essential, and some say, finest form. And it’s finally making the leap to the United States.
A regional spirit unregulated in its home country, clairin occupies a distinct, terroir-driven space in the rum spectrum. It even stands apart from better-known sugarcane distillates like rhum agricole or Brazilian cachaça.
Rum’s place in Caribbean culture is well known, but little is said about Haitian bottlings, despite the country housing more than 500 local distilleries—arguably more than any other country in the region. This booming DIY distilling scene makes Haiti home to some of the most diverse rum production in the world.
These hundreds of distilleries are called guildive in Haiti’s native Creole. It’s a French adaptation of “kill-devil,” an early colonial slang for rum. Guildives are small, rustic and run without electricity producing enough rum to serve their immediate village and not much more.
“The person with the most money in the neighborhood [owns] the guildive, producing clairin with a donkey pressing the cane juice that goes into wild fermentation,” says Garcelle Menos, account manager for spiced-clairin brand Boukman. “Most of the time, they’re a combination of column and pot stills, very small columns and very small pots.”
To make clairin, sugarcane is hand-harvested and carted by animals to the press. The resulting juice is moved to tanks where it ferments spontaneously. While there is no certification, clairin is largely organic simply because there is no industrialized farming or pesticides used in these remote villages. Low-yield varieties of sugarcane like crystalline and Madame Meuze, long ignored by industrial producers, are still planted and favored by local distillers for their concentrated flavor.
Published on April 12, 2018
TOPICS: Spirited Away
About 15 000 Haitian migrants have been repatriated on the Haiti-Dominican border so far this year
Published 2018-04-13 ¦ Le Nouvelliste
The wave of Haitians' repatriation living in irregular situations on the other side of the border continues. For the first three months of this year, no less than 14,782 cases of Haitians' repatriation were listed at official and unofficial border points. Among these repatriates, 56 were unaccompanied minors who were found in Malpasse and in Cornillon/virgin forest (West), said the Group of support for the repatriates and for the refugees (GARR).
A number of these repatriated people, pointed out GARR, "denounced the ill-treatment which they received from the Dominican authorities" before they were taken to the border. The repatriated immigrants declared they lived between three months and ten years in Dominican Republic. They lived for the greater part to Barahona, Tired Matas, San Juan, Santo Domingo.
Some of these migrants also undergone other blatant violation of their rights. Some of them assert having been locked into a bus which shuttled in the streets of the Dominican Republic in search of other Haitians. They were then led in a prison center and kept for more than three nights in inhuman conditions.
GARR also recounted that the border points which had most influx. Ouanaminthe/Dajabon (Northeast) is the official border point having welcomed the largest number of repatriates with a total of 6,893. The border Carisal/Comendador, Belladère comes in the second place with 5,989 repatriates. The official border point Anse-à-Pitre/Pedernales (southeast) welcomed more than 1,500 repatriates. Malpasse/Jimani with 290 repatriated people and Cornillon/virgin forest with a total of 110 people came in last.