Gang violence in Haiti continues to escalate. Reporter captures video in front of burning barricade in Haiti during a protest in 2024. Photo by Carlin Trezil @Unsplash

Although steps have been taken to restore democracy in Haiti with the appointment of a governing Transitional Presidential Council, violence continues to escalate in the nation’s capital, Port-au-Prince, and surrounding regions.  Therefore, many may ask where are the guns coming from to fuel Haiti’s escalating gang violence?  Haiti doesn’t manufacture weapons and produce ammunition, but the country is a factory for gun violence. In the Oct. 17, 2025 news report from the United Nations, it is estimated that up to 500,000 illegal weapons, ranging from handguns to battlefield-grade semi-automatic rifles, are thought to be in the hands of gangs in Haiti, even though the Caribbean country has been under a UN arms embargo for the last three years.  The UN arms embargo was authorized by the UN Security Council in 2022 and targets gangs and individuals deemed responsible for threatening Haiti’s peace and security. The embargo also calls on UN Member States to prohibit the supply, sale or transfer of arms and related material of all types, including technical assistance, training and financial support related to military activities.  But Haitian authorities are having limited success in stopping the flow of weapons, according to the UN report. For example, the report pointed out that one shipment of arms procured in Miami in the United States and intercepted in the Dominican Republic in February 2025 included a heavy Barret M82 semi-automatic rifle, sniper rifles, an Uzi submachine gun and more than 36,000 rounds of ammunition. Obviously, the embargo designed to help Haiti’s security has been circumvented. The UN report noted that well-established trafficking routes from the U.S., primarily from Miami – but also from New York via the Dominican Republic – continue to be exploited, often due to weak customs enforcement and corruption. “Some shipments are being intercepted by U.S. authorities before they reach Haiti. There is also evidence of weapons being shipped from Venezuela and other South American countries. Weapons are frequently concealed within mixed cargo or declared as humanitarian or commercial goods to evade inspection. There are also growing concerns that assault rifles originally registered to private security companies operating in Haiti are ending up in the hands of gang members,” the report said. Overall, Haiti faces a security crisis, a humanitarian crisis, and a hunger and food crisis, all intensified by gang violence. 

In 2024, more than 5,600 people were killed in Haiti because of gang violence, according to the UN.  However, other measures have been implemented to help with Haiti’s security, including the UN-authorized Multinational Security Support (MSS) Mission led by Kenya. The MSS Mission, which began in 2024, aimed to assist the Haitian National Police in restoring law and order amidst gang violence.  Some countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, such as The Bahamas, Jamaica, Belize, Guatemala and El Salvador, joined forces with the MSS Mission and deployed troops to Haiti.  Despite such efforts, gang violence continued. In September 2025, the UN Security Council authorized a new multinational Gang Suppression Force (GSF) in Haiti to replace the Kenyan-led security support mission, amid escalating gang violence, widespread rights abuses and a humanitarian emergency affecting all aspects of life in the island nation.  The GSF is expected to conduct intelligence-led operations to neutralize gangs, provide security for critical infrastructure and support humanitarian access. 

However, the deadly gang violence, which spiraled following the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, has caused thousands of Haitians to flee the country and many are displaced. The International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) Displacement Tracking Matrix Report indicated that the number of people displaced by violence and instability in Haiti has reached an unprecedented level, with more than 1.4 million people forced from their homes in 2025.  The ongoing violence in Haiti exemplifies a severe case of democratic erosion, where the weakening of state institutions and the rule of law have dismantled democratic governance. Democratic erosion occurs when the institutions, norms and freedoms that sustain democracy gradually deteriorate. In Haiti, armed gangs are outmatching state security forces and leaving citizens reliant on vigilante justice. The country has lacked a functioning parliament since 2023, and elections have been repeatedly postponed, resulting in an unelected transitional government. This institutional paralysis, combined with pervasive corruption and impunity, has eroded public trust and legitimacy. Citizens are unable to safely protest, campaign, or vote, as civic participation in gang-controlled areas has become life-threatening. The violence not only reflects state weakness, but also accelerates democratic decay by delegitimizing government authority, discouraging political participation and justifying authoritarian responses under the guise of restoring order. Thus, Haiti’s escalating violence represents a clear manifestation of democratic erosion through state collapse, where insecurity and institutional decay reinforce one another in a vicious cycle. 

In addition to democratic erosion, Haiti is also a case of democratic backsliding.  In the article “Democratic Backsliding,” author Nancy Bermeo describes democratic backsliding as the weakening or disassembling of a given set of democratic institutions and denotes the state-led debilitation or elimination of any of the political institutions that sustain an existing democracy.  The article also noted that democratic backsliding can constitute democratic breakdown or the serious weakening of existing democratic institutions for undefined ends. Bermeo added that when backsliding yields situations that are fluid and ill-defined, taking action to defend democracy becomes particularly difficult.  This can be seen with the Multinational Security Support (MSS) Mission led by Kenya which, according to the UN, faced chronic underfunding, insufficient personnel, and limited operational capacity, making it difficult to contain gangs that now control large parts of Port-au-Prince. 

However, discovering ways to address Haiti’s gang violence must involve a rigorous, bold and strategic approach to stopping the flow of illegal weapons in the country. This must involve regional and international efforts to prohibit the sale of firearms and ammunition to Haiti and its neighboring countries.