We need your help now
Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.
You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.
If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.
Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
By continuing, you are indicating that you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
MEMBERS OF A UN peacekeeping mission engaged in “transactional sex” with more than 225 Haitian women who said they needed to do so to obtain things like food and medication according to a new report obtained by The Associated Press.
The draft by the Office of Internal Oversight Services looks at the way UN peacekeeping, which has about 125,000 people in some of the world’s most troubled areas, deals with the persistent problem of sexual abuse and exploitation.
The report, expected to be released this month, says major challenges remain a decade after a ground-breaking UN report first tackled the issue.
Among its findings:
To help demonstrate that, investigators headed to the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
A year ago, the report says, investigators interviewed 231 people in Haiti who said they’d had transactional sexual relationships with UN peacekeepers. “For rural women, hunger, lack of shelter, baby care items, medication and household items were frequently cited as the ‘triggering need,’” the report says. Urban and suburban women received “church shoes,’ cell phones, laptops and perfume, as well as money.
“In cases of non-payment, some women withheld the badges of peacekeepers and threatened to reveal their infidelity via social media,” the report says. “Only seven interviewees knew about the United Nations policy prohibiting sexual exploitation and abuse.” None knew about the mission’s hotline to report it.
For all of last year, the total number of allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation against members of all UN peacekeeping missions was 51, down from 66 the year before, according to the secretary-general’s latest annual report on the issue.
The draft report doesn’t say over what time frame the “transactional sex” in Haiti occurred. The peacekeeping mission there was first authorised in 2004 and, as of the end of March, had more than 7,000 uniformed troops. It is one of four peacekeeping missions that have accounted for the most allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation in recent years, along with those in Congo, Liberia and South Sudan.
One of the U.N. staffers who produced the report would not comment Tuesday, saying it was better to wait until it was released publicly. A spokesman for the peacekeeping office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Same thing happened in Liberia and Sierra Leone as well as the Congo.
No words to describe someone who would do this.
There are words but most of them you couldn’t post here
There was a time that blue helmet stood for honour..that’s being undermined by the sc um doing this.
So now they just join the un peace keeping missions instead of the church missions? Wherever there is an opportunity to abuse, abusers will use it. abusers will always look for work in areas where there is access to children or people they can manipulate. This should have been foreseen and checks and systems put in place to ensure the safety of the vulnerable. what a disgusting abuse of power.
Lol this is the same UN who tries to lecture us on rights!!
no, these are the guys on the ground.
Representing the UN.
and you understand representing something and being something are different? like my lawer represents me, but he isn’t me.
People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Don’t go scolding us on rights when their representatives are out raping children.
The UN scolded you on rights? What did you do?
The content of what was said was still correct, irrespective of who uttered it. They obviously need to deal with these problems but that does not take from the fact that we need to deal with ours. I don’t care who points it out once we start to come up with a better way to treat our pregnant victims of child abuse, rape or women carrying foetus with fatal foetal abnormalities. if a criminal reports a crime, does it make it less of a crime?
yes, Irish guys on the ground..
Any chance of a bit of proof there, Amy? We only sent a handful of specialists to Haiti so you (and the Journal who have left this up for 8 hours and counting) are defaming a dangerously small group otherwise
Was it only Brazilian peacekeepers who engaged in this? If not why are Brazilians the only ones they have shown a picture of? Many people don’t read the entire article, but get the info from the introduction and accompanying photos. From that you could infer that the problem is confined to the Brazilians.
Are you advocating more pictures, less words or a pop-up version for the lazy?
We would need 193 photos to cover every nation.
Think your comment through the next time
@j.Dunn. That’s not what I’m advocating. My issue is that Brazilians were the only nationality named in the photos. Had it been simply a photo of peacekeepers, then no problem. It is not inconceivable that people would connect the information in the text with the information in the photo – in fact there’s a whole body of research dedicated to that. It’s called semiotics.
So a headline stating that un peacekeepers are engaging in unlawful sex is run with a picture with the caption – Brazilian peacekeepers. It’s the only picture which states a nationality. Maybe I’m over analysing, but if the nationality is not relevant, why specifically state it?
Could you imagine the uproar if this story appeared in an American newspaper, for example, next to a picture with the caption ‘Irish UN peacekeepers in Haiti’.
I agree with Anne. I read the article expecting to find a link between Brazilian troops and the events reported.
Lending credence to the uproars of picture readers is the real problem.
P.c crap Anne
Where do the Irish troops that are sent in to these UN missions fit in? Why is it not referenced? Does that mean we should believe these people could be Irish (the UN “peacekeepers”) as they certainly did not write anything not to make a person believe that. I would not be surprised.
Good girl Amy. If no-one tells you otherwise, assume the Irish are paedophiles and rapists. Perfectly reasonable
Humans trade food for sex? Shock horror….
How about this scenario. . 6 food packs/mobile phones/whatever to give out to 12 people.. Each of them equally deserving.. how do you choose who gets what? Human nature being what it is.. women will use their gender to an advantage to get what they want.. It happens in all walks of life
A lot of them were under 18 and these people were supposed to be there to help, not take advantage.
Also making the ‘peacekeepers’ look like they were victims of these women and children is actually disgusting. I’m pretty sure there is a protocol to decide who gets what that doesn’t involve women or children having to perform sexual acts and these men were trained to use said protocol.
still doesnt answer the question though.. i am sure there are protocols for everything but human nature being what it is .. desperate circumstances require desperate measures.. “Widespread confusion remains on the ground about consensual sex and exploitation. obviously sexual practices involving children is a criminal abuse and should be punished severely” .. its the “transactional sex” I am commenting on here..
It is still taking advantage of power that they have. Transactional sex is an abuse of power here and human nature is a ridiculous argument to use to excuse men trading supplies that they were to deliver to these people for sex.
transactional sex is an abuse of womens power .. couldnt agree more ..
That’s right frank, because those poor defenseless men were made to use supplies they were entrusted with as bartering tools by evil women. if they are not strong enough or decent enough to carry out the duties they are paid to carry out without being lured by women to trade for sex, the pathetic idiots should not be in that position. desperate times may call for desperate measures in these women’s cases but what excuse do these men have for using those circumstances to get sexual favours with supplies that aren’t actually even theirs to begin with!? I’m pretty sure there are thousands of men who didn’t do this though they had the opportunity but could tell that it was wrong and that it was an abuse of their power. if you feel that it is ok, I hope you are never left around vulnerable women in desperate situations.
have your say