Haiti welcomes UN admission, plans to assist cholera victims

A UN acknowledgement that it played a role in introducing cholera to Haiti and vows to aid victims have been welcomed in the Caribbean nation, which has experienced the worst outbreak of the disease in recent history.
While the number of cholera cases has been significantly reduced from the initial outbreak in 2010, the fact that the preventable disease is still routinely sickening and killing Haitians is galling to many.
"The UN brought this sickness to Haiti so they need to pay the country back. A lot of people got sick, a lot have died," said Michelle Raymond, who said her young son nearly died of the waterborne disease in 2013.

This week, deputy spokesman Farhan Haq acknowledged the United Nations' "own involvement" in the introduction of cholera to impoverished Haiti and pledged that "a significantly new set of UN actions" will be presented in the next two months.
Yesterday, Haq added that "the United Nations has a moral responsibility to the victims." He said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is developing a package that would provide "material assistance" to cholera victims in Haiti, indicating for the first time that some people might get financial help from the UN.
For years the UN had denied or been silent on longstanding allegations that it was responsible for the outbreak, while answering lawsuits in US courts by claiming immunity under a 1946 convention.

Haq reiterated that the world body's legal position on immunity has not changed.

In a decision issued late Thursday, the US 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York upheld the United Nations' immunity from a high-profile claim filed on behalf of 5,000 cholera victims who blame the UN for the epidemic in a country where any number of diseases thrive.
Brian Concannon, executive director of the Boston-based Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti, said victims' advocates will be watching the UN's actions closely. They have 90 days to decide whether to appeal to the US Supreme Court.
"We will decide how to proceed based on whether the UN's actions fulfil the cholera victims' rights to an effective remedy," Concannon said in a statement.

Researchers say there is ample scientific evidence the disease was introduced to Haiti's biggest river by inadequately treated sewage from a base of UN peacekeepers from Nepal, one of the units that have rotated in and out of a multinational force in Haiti since 2004.