Above: Lieutenant-General Augusto Heleno Ribeiro Pereira form Brazil (centre), Force Commander of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), conferring with some United Nations soldiers in Port-au-Prince in 2004. (UN Photo: Evan Schneider)
Brazil will begin pulling out its troops from the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti, Defence Minister Celso Amorim announced. “We can’t have a disorganised exit that creates a situation of chaos,” he told BBC News. The minister said the security situation had improved since 2004, when the mission first came to Haiti. “In the medium and long term, it is not good for Haiti and it is not good for those who are there that the mission be perpetuated,” he said. Brazil has 2,000 of the 12,000 peacekeepers currently in Haiti. [BBC]
