REGISTRATION FOR THE WEBINAR (Free and open to the public)

 

Featuring:

Keith Mines. Director of the Latin America program at U.S. Institute of Peace.

Louis-Henri Mars. Executive Director of Lakou Lapè. Peace Building in Haiti.

 

Moderator:

Ambassador Patrick Duddy. Director of Duke University Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies.

 

Haiti is experiencing one of the most difficult moments in its troubled history. In the aftermath of the July 2021 assassination of President Moïse, political instability and criminal violence affect all aspects of daily life. Gang activity has all but incapacitated efforts to provide food and medical supplies. Homicides and kidnappings have skyrocketed. Calls for an international rescue effort have not yet been answered. The international community is struggling to find a way to support restoration of the rule of law, provide urgently needed humanitarian assistance, and strengthen the government of Haiti’s capacity to govern. The United Nations’ Integrated Office in Haiti noted last year that “the current situation … demonstrates the extent to which political, security, development and humanitarian dimensions are intertwined and mutually reinforcing…”.

 

Join Keith Mines, Louis-Henri Mars and Ambassador Patrick Duddy for a wide-ranging discussion of the current crisis, Haiti’s most urgent needs, and the prospects for robust international help and what form that should take.

 

Keith Mines joined USIP after a career at the State Department, where he was most recently director for Andean and Venezuelan affairs. In 32 years of diplomatic and military service, he has worked on governance and institution building in Central America and Colombia; Middle East peace in Israel and the West Bank; post-conflict stabilization in Haiti, Iraq and Afghanistan; global financial stability and the environment in Brazil; security sector reform in Hungary; famine relief and tribal reconciliation in Darfur and Somali; and creating a culture of lawfulness as the first director of the Merida Initiative in Mexico City. Mines has written extensively on post-conflict stabilization, peacebuilding and negotiations, and the roots of civil conflict. His book, Why Nation Building Matters: Political Consolidation, Building Security Forces, and Economic Development in Failed and Fragile States, was published by the University of Nebraska Press in 2020. Mines has a bachelor’s degree in history from Brigham Young University and a master’s degree in foreign service from Georgetown University.

 

Louis-Henri Mars is the executive director of Lakou Lapè (@lakoulape) a Port-au-Prince-based peacebuilding organization since 2013. Mr. Mars has worked in the private sector, as a business owner and manager of assembly and manufacturing plants in Haiti. He holds certificates in conflict transformation and dialogue facilitation from the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation out of Dublin, Ireland and from the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding of Eastern Mennonite University. Since 2007, he has been exclusively engaged in activities related to fostering peace and reconciliation in Haiti.

 

“I became engaged in peacebuilding as I noticed the recurring cycles of violence in Haiti and wanted to help in breaking those cycles and reconcile relationships between Haitians.”

 

Patrick Duddy is the Senior Advisor on Global Affairs at Duke University and Director of the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies. From 2007 to 2010 he served as the U.S. Ambassador to the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela for both President Bush and President Obama. Prior to this, Ambassador Duddy served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State (DAS) for the Western Hemisphere. Currently he is a fellow with the Caribbean Policy Consortium. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.