May 4, 2021
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Global Financial Integrity (GFI) and other non-governmental organizations released a letter today calling on the United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken to assist the Haitian government in fighting corruption.
Recent violent protests in Haiti underscore the people’s frustration with systemic corruption that exists within the government. The Biden Administration has presented a foreign policy goal of addressing corruption around the world and, as such, must support the Haitian government in developing critically important anti-corruption measures. This would be beneficial to the people of Haiti, the United States of America and the world.
GFI and its co-signers call on the Biden Administration to create a “Haiti Cooperation Group” (HCG) composed of multilateral institutions, donor countries and like-minded governments in the region. The HCG should support the creation of an autonomous anti-corruption investigation and prosecution body in order to root out grand corruption in government ministries and should help establish an Anti-Corruption Commission to address petty corruption within the police force and in government agencies that provide services to citizens.
These steps are critical in fighting corruption at all levels of the Haitian government. Implementing a new framework of transparency in Haiti would empower civil society and would foster a stable U.S. ally in the region.
Tom Cardamone, President and CEO of Global Financial Integrity, issued the following statement: “Over the years the U.S. government has been very generous in providing humanitarian assistance when the people of Haiti have been battered by tropical storms, hurricanes or earthquakes. But the U.S. has been far less supportive in helping them deal with their daily hardship due to unrelenting corruption at all levels of government. With a new administration comes a new opportunity to work with partners as well as with the Haitian people – civil society, private sector and government – to begin the process of recovery from decades of endemic corruption.”
In addition to Secretary Blinkin, the letter was also sent to Senator Robert Menendez, Senator James Risch, Senator Timothy Kaine, Senator Marco Rubio, Senator Ben Cardin, Senator Patrick Leahy, Representative Gregory Meeks, Representative Michael McCaul, Representative Albio Sires, Representative Mark Green, Representative Yvette Clarke, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, Representative Michael Waltz, Representative Tom Malinowski, Representative James Clyburn, and to the U.S. Ambassador to Haiti, Michele Sison.
###
ABOUT GFI: Global Financial Integrity (GFI) is a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, producing high-caliber analyses of illicit financial flows, advising developing country governments on effective policy solutions and promoting pragmatic transparency measures in the international financial system as a means to global development and security.
CONTACT:
Lauren Anikis
Communications Coordinator
[email protected]
@IllicitFlows