Poverty undermining security in Haiti

UNITED NATIONS, March 20 (UPI) -- A report from a U.N. fact-finding mission to Haiti said widespread poverty is undermining ongoing operations to stabilize the country.

U.N. Ambassador Jorge Urbina recently led a delegation to Haiti on a four-day mission. Urbina said that despite a push by the United Nations to help security forces in Haiti stabilize the country, poverty and vulnerability to disasters is limiting the impact, the United Nations reported.

The United Nations has been working closely with police agencies in Haiti in a move to counter the threat of transnational criminal groups that have based their operations in the country. Urbina said that while security-sector and judicial reforms are making progress, widespread poverty is undermining stability.

"It does appear that there is a window of opportunity to enable the consolidation of stability and the undertaking of a process of sustainable development," Urbina told the Security Council, according to the United Nations.

"(But) it seemed evident to the mission that current levels of extreme poverty, with 80 percent of the population subsisting on less than two dollars a day and 50 percent with less than one dollar, are incompatible with the goal of attaining stability in the short term."