Aid community offers to help authorities plan rising camp closures, find alternative housing
BOGOTA (AlertNet) - Tens of thousands of Haitian earthquake survivors have been forced to leave camps sprawled across the capital Port-au-Prince, and a growing number are at risk of eviction, the United Nations said this week.
Around 1.5 million Haitians made homeless by last year's massive quake sought shelter in makeshift tent cities set up on public and private land, of whom nearly 600,000 are still living in camps.
So far nearly 70,000 people have been thrown out of these settlements, and the number of camps where people face the threat of eviction has increased by 400 percent in a year, from 87 in July 2010 to 348 this July, the United Nations says.
"The humanitarian community in Haiti reiterates its opposition to forced evictions, which only exacerbate existing vulnerabilities of camp populations," the U.N.'s humanitarian coordinator in Haiti, Nigel Fisher, said on Tuesday.
He urged the Haitian authorities to protect the rights of displaced people living in camps, and said camps should only be closed if the government can guarantee people safe housing elsewhere. Only a small fraction of displaced families have been resettled in new homes.
The aid community hopes to set up a platform linking relevant ministries, local authorities, the police, the private sector and humanitarian groups, Fisher said. "The proposed structure would allow for effective planning for progressive camp closures, while identifying alternative housing solutions in both urban and rural settings," he added.
Haiti's recovery from the earthquake has been hampered by political infighting among Haitian lawmakers, weak coordination among international aid groups, and billions of dollars in donor pledges that have yet to be disbursed.
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