Haitian prime minister announces resignation amid violence

Haitian Prime Minster Ariel Henry announced Tuesday he will step down from his position as violence continues to rage in the Caribbean country.

Henry said he will resign upon the creation of a transitional presidential council following a recent meeting between Caribbean leaders and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Jamaica, where they agreed to a joint proposal to establish a transitional council focused on the crisis, according to The Associated Press.

“The government that I’m running cannot remain insensitive in front of this situation. There is no sacrifice that is too big for our country,” Henry said in a statement on video, per the AP. “The government I’m running will remove itself immediately after the installation of the council.”

Haiti has been in a state of emergency amid intense gang violence, with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs saying in an update last week that more than 360,000 people have been displaced because of the violence. 

The prime minster couldn’t even enter Haiti due to its main international airports being closed because of the violence, the AP reported. Henry was also blocked from landing in the neighboring Dominican Republic because officials in the country said he did not have a required flight plan.

The U.S. recently sent forces to the island nation to increase security and extract personnel from its embassy in Port-au-Prince. In a statement, U.S. Southern Command said that troops airlifted personnel into and out of the embassy and “conducted an operation to augment the security of the U.S. Embassy.”

“This airlift of personnel into and out of the embassy is consistent with our standard practice for embassy security augmentation worldwide, and no Haitians were on board the military aircraft,” the command said in the statement.

The violence in Haiti entered the public spotlight after the assassination of former President Jovenel Moïse on July 7, 2021. Henry, who has served the longest single term in the role since the country’s constitution was put in place in 1987, was sworn in nearly two weeks after Moïse’s death.

The Associated Press contributed.