Doctors Without Borders halts operations in Haiti’s capital, citing police threats

The humanitarian group accused authorities in the lawless Haitian capital of repeatedly stopping its vehicles and threatening its staff with violence, including death and rape.

A vital humanitarian organization said it will suspend activities in Haiti’s capital on Wednesday following a “series of threats” by local police, in a move that threatens to bring a further deterioration of conditions in the Caribbean nation that has struggled for years with gang warfare and political turmoil. Doctors Without Borders, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), accused authorities of repeatedly stopping its vehicles and threatening its staff with violence, including death and rape. MSF cited a deadly incident on November 11, when officers and vigilantes allegedly attacked one of its ambulances as it was transporting three wounded patients to an MSF hospital in Port-au-Prince. At least two patients were killed, the group told CNN last week. Following that attack, the organization said it faced four additional encounters with police. “This series of incidents have left us with no choice but to suspend our activities in Port-au-Prince,” MSF said in a statement. In recent years, police, civilian vigilante groups and even rival gangs in the lawless capital have been repeatedly accused by doctors and medical staff of breaking into health care facilities where they suspect wounded gang members to be seeking treatment.