Cité-Soleil: grinding poverty, relentless violence

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28-06-2006 Photo Collection

Cité-Soleil: grinding poverty, relentless violence

Built in the 1960s to house a few thousand workers, Cité-Soleil is now one of the largest shantytowns in the northern hemisphere and a microcosm of all the ills that beset Haitian society: endemic unemployment, illiteracy, the collapse of public services, insalubrity, crime and violence.

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A MINUSTAH soldier keeps watch over the comings and goings near Cité-Soleil's main market place – MINUSTAH arrived in Haiti in June 2004 after the turbulent departure of president Aristide. Its mission was to ensure a modicum of law and order so that the transitional government could organize elections and work out a new political framework for the country. Cité-Soleil experienced a period of relative calm after René Préval was elected president in February 2006, but in late June new incidents broke out again.

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