(Bloomberg) -- US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Haiti this week to discuss an eventual political transition for the violence-plagued Caribbean nation as an international security force is confronting criminal gangs that overran the capital Port-au-Prince.
Blinken will meet Thursday with Haitian Prime Minister Garry Conille and senior members of the multinational security support missions that’s authorized by the United Nations, and then will hold meetings in the Dominican Republic on Friday, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Wednesday.
Blinken will discuss the impoverished nation’s “return to a democratic path and the urgent need for elections” as the 400 Kenyan police currently on the ground make progress and free up “pockets” of the capital, Brian Nichols, the State Department’s top diplomat for the region, said in a separate briefing with reporters Wednesday morning.
Blinken also will raise “the importance of transparency, rule of law and dealing with the corruption allegations that have come to light,” Nichols said, after Haiti’s anti-corruption agency reportedly leveled allegations against government officials. With more funds desperately needed, Nichols said one way of ensuring sustainable funding and administrative support for the international mission would be to make it a formal UN peacekeeping operation.
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