S/PV.5284 Security Council

I should like to inform the Council that I have received a letter from the representative of Haiti, in which he requests to be invited to participate in the discussion of the item on the Council’s agenda. In conformity with the usual practice, I propose, with the consent of the Council, to invite that representative to participate in the discussion without the right to vote, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Charter and rule 37 of the Council’s provisional rules of procedure. There being no objection, it is so decided. I request the Chief of Protocol to escort His Excellency Mr. Gérard Latortue, Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti, to a seat at the Council table.

On behalf of the Council, I extend a warm welcome to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti. The Security Council will now begin its consideration of the item on its agenda. The Council is meeting in accordance with the understanding reached in its prior consultations. Members of the Council have before them document S/2005/631, which contains the report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti. I now invite the Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti to make a statement.

This is the second time this year that I have had the opportunity to meet with the members of the Security Council and to discuss the situation in Haiti with them. I have read with interest the report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) as it relates to the political environment in Haiti, the preparations for elections, and every aspect of security and safety. With respect to those three points, I should like to make some brief comments and to convey the gratitude of the Government of Haiti for the support being provided by the United Nations system through MINUSTAH. First, with respect to the political environment, I reaffirm the commitment of the Transitional Government to ensuring the transfer of power on 7 February 2006, the constitutionally agreed date. The President of the Republic, I and all the members of the Government consider our commitment to be a guarantee of the Government’s credibility. Alongside MINUSTAH and the other international organizations assisting us — including the Organization of American States, the International Organization of la Francophonie and the many donors — we have sought to ensure that the elections and the transfer of power will take place smoothly on 7 February. The President of the Republic will transfer power to the president elect and, several days later, I hope, the new President will form his Government and appoint a new Prime Minister. I, in turn, will pass on my authority to whosoever is approved by Parliament. The political situation in Haiti has, I believe, evolved in the right direction since I was last here. I say the “right direction” because, even as we have more than 40 political parties and more than 30 presidential candidates in Haiti today, I am pleased to inform the Council that the political parties are working very well together. They are now talking to each other. I wish here to thank the Government of Norway, which has organized several meetings in Norway to which every political party has been invited and where they have all learned to work together. They have signed a governability pact guaranteeing that, whichever party is elected and whosoever may become President after the elections, they will work with the opposition and acknowledge its rights. I believe that this is a first in the political history of our country. We are also pleased to inform you that we have done our utmost to ensure that all political parties are included in the electoral process. Indeed, today all parties are represented, and there are fewer and fewer problems with the political parties in Haiti. In fact, just today political parties met to set up an electoral safeguards commission. Obviously, for our new President to be able to take power on 7 February, first we need to hold elections. We have met with some delay in the electoral process, owing in particular to the fact that the Provisional Electoral Council did not grasp the true nature of its functions, that the nine Counsellors were part of an electoral council, and as with any council, the members should not be concerned with the day-to- day management of the electoral process. The Council is there to set the major guidelines, to define objectives and strategies and to monitor. The execution of those functions, however, should be carried out by an executive structure. That has now been done. Last Saturday, we installed a new Director General of the Provisional Electoral Council, who will oversee implementation of all the major decisions adopted by Council. That decision was taken in close cooperation with MINUSTAH. We are very pleased to see that the whole international community present in Haiti witnessed the investiture of the new Director General and gave him the necessary support so that today he can speed up the electoral process. In terms of legislation, we have also taken a whole series of measures to reduce the time for litigation, to eliminate any constraints that could have slowed it down. As soon as I get back to Haiti next week — and certainly as soon as Mr. Valdés gets back, as we work closely together — we will definitely be in a position to submit a new electoral timetable to guarantee the handing over of power on 7 February. In the area of security, I can say that since the Security Council’s decree of new measures in June, with the strengthening of MINUSTAH’s mandate and, above all, with the promises and recommendations for greater cooperation and coordination between MINUSTAH and the National Police, things are going much better. Currently in Haiti we are speaking less and less of security problems. If one or two pockets of insecurity remain, they have been reduced to a minimum, and I think that with the upcoming arrival of 700 police officers from Jordan those problems will be behind us. We owe that success to the excellent cooperation between MINUSTAH and the National Police. That cooperation was made possible by the Government’s decision to appoint a new Director General for the National Police, one with a better understanding of what such a partnership entails. Today that partnership guarantees that security is not such a serious problem in Haiti as it was when we first met. Of course, there still remains the major problem of disarmament. We have disarmament, demobilization and reintegration teams in place and they are beginning to make headway. It should be remembered, unfortunately, that in the area of disarmament the solutions achieved by some countries cannot always be applied wholesale in another. MINUSTAH and the National Police are working in close collaboration to disarm the gangs that existed in Haiti, and during the past year they have made noteworthy progress. However, one thing that the Government observed was that some gangs were working in complicity with agents of the National Police. Fortunately, the new Director General for the National Police was courageous enough to put his own house in order. Indeed, he told me just a few days ago that one source of insecurity was corrupt police officers recruited under the former regime. Because of the impunity they enjoyed, those officers were able to extort money from the population and kidnapped innocent civilians. Last Saturday the Director General arrested 15 police officers. The house cleaning continues. Those gangs were able to function above all thanks to the complicity they enjoyed with the police. Purging the department is extremely important and delicate work that jeopardizes the very life of our new Director General. I take pleasure in thanking MINUSTAH. When MINUSTAH understood the situation, it sent us their own police officers to help ensure the security of our new police chief. I believe that we are now headed in the right direction. Now, of course, we have to try still harder to maintain the security environment during the electoral process. We have appealed to the European Union to see if they can make police officers available to us just for that period. Tomorrow I will be in Paris, and I will meet with President Diouf, Secretary-General of the International Organization of la Francophonie. He has also promised to assist us in finding a number of French-speaking police officers who could join in MINUSTAH’s efforts as reinforcements during the electoral process. Canada has also just sent us a few additional police officers. In other words, one should not be misled by the apparent calm reigning in Haiti today. There are still forces opposed to democracy and to the transfer of power through transparent and free elections. It is up to us, together, to do everything in our power and to strengthen security during the electoral process. On the topic of security, I should not fail to mention the problem of human rights and the human rights situation in Haiti. This is always a very ticklish subject; it depends on which side you approach it from. On one side there are gangs that can arrest, kill or torture people with complete impunity. On the other side is the National Police, not always very strong or very well armed, but who, helped by MINUSTAH, are responsible for suppressing such acts of violence. The line between defending human rights and the fight against impunity is sometimes rather blurry. I have seen attacks in the international press not just against the National Police, but also against MINUSTAH, accusing those institutions of violating the human rights of gang members. I can assure members that if there is any semblance of human rights violations, those violations are not deliberate. MINUSTAH is trying to protect the Haitian population; MINUSTAH is trying to protect the innocent people who are being attacked. And the National Police is joining forces with MINUSTAH to ensure that security prevails in Haiti. There may be setbacks and blunders, but be assured that if we discover them and there is proof, the National Police, under the command of its new chief and with the support of the Minister of Justice, are prepared to pursue all those who deliberately give themselves the right to violate human rights. The arrest of those 15 police officers is additional proof of the Government’s resolve to ensure respect for human rights. As we are discussing human rights, there is, however, one aspect that I must dwell on for a moment: the whole issue of justice in Haiti. We live in a country where the judicial system has, for various reasons, been corrupt for decades. One can well imagine that in a little less than two years, the Transitional Government has not been able to right all the wrongs of the past. But we want the international community to give high priority to justice in its cooperation programme with Haiti. Technical assistance from the international community must help us reform our justice system, train judges and create working conditions for magistrates that will ensure their independence. The political will is there, but the resources are not always available, and attitudes must change. This is a long-term effort. I am pleased that a number of countries in the international community, such as France and Canada, have already indicated their intention to help us in this area. Our judicial system was inherited from the Napoleonic Code, and I will be in Paris tomorrow to meet with French officials. In the context of recommencing cooperation with France, the area of justice will be a priority in the discussions I will have with the French Prime Minister on Thursday. We in the Government are certain — and we hope that the Government that succeeds us will continue in the same direction — that, without justice, we cannot have development, and without justice, we cannot have the rule of law, for which we are all working. Another point related to justice brings me to the humanitarian situation and the issue of development in Haiti. The humanitarian situation remains precarious. Considerable efforts have been made by the Government, thanks to good political and economic governance. This year, we were once again able to submit the new budget — for the fiscal year 2005-2006 — by the 1 October deadline. That budget is balanced. There is no deficit and no recourse to the central bank. That was difficult to accomplish, especially in a period of crisis, but it was essential in order to restore the kind of credibility that Haiti had 20 or 25 years ago. The support that the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are giving us today is the most eloquent proof that the Transitional Government’s good economic and financial management is beginning to bear fruit. Of course, the Interim Cooperation Framework has made a certain quantity of resources available to us. Resources have not always been made available to us at the right time. But on the whole, the Interim Cooperation Framework has helped significantly to strengthen stability and create jobs in Haiti. A number of infrastructure projects have been established. The funds have been slow in coming. In particular, since the expansion of the European Union, European funds are arriving with much greater difficulty. I venture to hope that in the meetings we will have with the European Union in Brussels next Thursday and Friday, we will be able to consider together how to improve the situation, because there are cases that sometimes really cause problems for us. For example, more than a year ago, we announced the funding of the road from Cap-Haitien to the Dominican border at Dajabon. Everyone talked about it; they told us we were going to begin at one time or another. A year has passed, and we have still not begun to build even one kilometre of road. We all know that the international bureaucracy is slow, and efforts are being made to speed up in Haiti’s case. But in Haiti we have a country in crisis, a country that was virtually threatened with civil war. If we could speed up the bureaucracy a little, that would be good. There are organizations that have made considerable efforts. I know, for example, that the Inter-American Development Bank has tried very hard, under the presidency of Mr. Iglesias, to move faster to ensure the right of non-objection, even in Port-au- Prince. But there are still very lengthy procedures there that slow things down. That does not prevent projects from being approved, which pleases us. Even if we do not have the opportunity to begin work, at least the next Government, following the principle of State continuity, will have a basis upon which it can continue to work to improve Haitians’ living conditions. In conclusion, I take this opportunity to thank the Security Council for having supported us, most recently in June by renewing MINUSTAH’s mandate until 15 February 2006. But I must tell Council members that 15 February will be eight days after the arrival of the new Government, which will still need MINUSTAH’s presence for a certain period of time, if not a long time. Since to govern is to plan, I should like to alert the Council now to the need to begin to consider, in preparing 2006 budgets, that Haiti will still need the continuation of the MINUSTAH programme for at least a certain period of time. I wanted to share that idea with the Council and to express, on behalf of the Government and the people of Haiti, the heartfelt gratitude of the Haitian nation for the efforts of members of the Security Council to contribute to the stabilization and development of Haiti.

I thank the Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti for his important statement. I take this opportunity to express, on behalf of the Security Council, our appreciation to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti for coming to address the Council. The Security Council has thus concluded the present stage of its consideration of the item on its agenda. In accordance with the understanding reached earlier, I should now like to invite Council members to informal consultations following the adjournment of this meeting.