Two months after arguably the worst natural disaster of modern times, Haiti faces further calamity as more than 200,000 quake survivors camp in putrid tent cities at risk of major flooding.
The full number made homeless by the Jan. 12 earthquake is far higher, some 1.3 million, but as the rainy season approaches the UN considers 218,000 people in 21 Port-au-Prince camps to be at risk.
“The problem with the rainy season is it is a very indefinite deadline,” said Kristen Knutson, a spokeswoman for the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
The government is struggling to buy land to set up emergency camps outside the capital, but these areas will take up to six weeks to turn into viable sites and Knutson said moving people outside the capital was a “last resort.”
“Relocation is what people focus on because it’s very visual, you can see the site, and because of all the dynamics of identifying the land, buying the land,” the UN spokeswoman said.
“It’s dramatic. But there are other choices that are available for people and if they are better for people and they are available we want them to take them. We want people to be where they want to be,” she said.
Those with houses still standing are being encouraged to return home, but many are still traumatized by what happened and engineers and architects have to painstakingly assess which buildings are structurally sound.
Others are being advised to move back home and camp if a safe plot can be found, while 600,000 people have already opted to move in with host families.
Only when those possibilities have been exhausted and no closer site can be found will it be recommended that those at risk on the Port-au-Prince flood plains be relocated outside the capital.
Santo 17, a first planned site with an initial capacity of 1,400 opened on Saturday at Croix-des-Bouquets, a town 13km northeast of the capital.
Heavy rains poured fresh misery on Port-au-Prince early on Monday, and mother-of-six Berta Romelus said she spent a miserable night sleeping on her feet as the rain gushed under her tent.
Even though rain turned the camp of more than 4,000 homeless, in a former soccer stadium in the suburb of Petionville, into a giant latrine, Romelus scoffed at the idea of moving.
“They cannot decide for us, we want to see first where they want to move us. We don’t want to go to Croix-des-Bouquets, it is too far. We want to live close to here. We are going to stay here whatever happens,” she said.
Behind Romelus were the only tents capable of resisting the rains, but these are reserved for children and babies — one was born overnight during some of the heaviest rains since the quake, which killed more than 220,000 people.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS