PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Violence permeates every fiber of Haitian society. It used to linger on the outskirts of the capital, targeting the poorest, but now everyone — from street vendors to doctors to schoolchildren — are in its grip.
Yet, people find ways to keep living.
For the first half of 2024, Associated Press photographers have documented how violence has affected the capital, Port-au-Prince, and what it looks like on a daily basis as people go about their lives, going to work, school and grocery shopping.
It’s become increasingly common to see victims of violence sprawled on busy streets.
You see people on motorcycles zooming past bodies in the middle of a road or sidestepping them on sidewalks. Some glance at the bodies; others just stay the course. It’s also common to see dogs or other animals gnawing on the remains of a body left abandoned on a street.
Every day, gunfire scatters Haitians who flee the streets and hide behind a wall or a column of a nearby building for protection as gangs battle for more turf.
Gang violence has displaced more than a half million people, forcing tens of thousands to cram into makeshift shelters including schools.
Still, you see people from children to the elderly finding moments of hope, smiling, laughing, playing, studying. There are moments of calm, however brief, like when a child rested her head on her mother’s lap as she got her hair styled at a shelter.
Haiti has been under siege by violent gangs that control 80% of the capital and whose tentacles reach beyond Port-au-Prince.
The country is now at a crossroads as it welcomes the fourth major foreign intervention in its history: a U.N.-backed mission led by Kenya that will soon be joined by personnel from countries including the Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Benin, Chad and Jamaica for a total of 2,500 police and soldiers.
Haitians hope they can return to their regular routines and break free from the shackles of gangs that have killed, raped and injured thousands of people in recent years.
Haiti also is preparing to hold long-awaited elections as it slowly emerges from years of political tumult that included the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, the April resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Henry and the installation of a new prime minister and a transitional presidential council.