UNITED NATIONS (CMC) — The Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Wednesday that escalating armed violence in Haiti has triggered a “profound” humanitarian crisis.

UNICEF said at least 170,000 children are now displaced — double the number from last year — amid a surge in gang-led killings and kidnappings, sexual violence and a severe food crisis.

“In Haiti, children and families are enduring relentless waves of brutal violence, with each day bringing new horrors, the loss of loved ones, homes being destroyed by fire, and an ever-present shadow of fear,” said Bruno Maes, UNICEF representative in the French-speaking Caribbean country, who visited three displacement sites in the capital Port-au-Prince.

Latest UNICEF data revealed that nearly 314,000 people, roughly half of them children, have been uprooted across Haiti, mainly in the capital and the Artibonite department.

In less than two weeks, nearly 2,500 people, most of them women and children, have been newly displaced following clashes in the Solino and Gabelliste areas in the capital, UNICEF said.

It estimates that three million children across Haiti will require humanitarian aid this year.

The UN agency said it is seeking US$221.7 million to respond to the needs

The United Nations Special Representative to Haiti Maria Isabel Salvador told the UN Security Council that the crisis in Haiti had reached “a critical point”.

“I cannot over stress the severity of the situation in Haiti, where multiple protracted crises have reached a critical point,” said Salvador in presenting the latest report of the UN political office in Haiti, known by the French acronym as BINUH.

She said more than 8,400 people were victims of gang violence in Haiti last year, including killings, injuries and kidnappings, a 122 per cent increase over 2022.

Salvador said the impoverished Caribbean country remains plagued by mounting violence and insecurity at the hands of armed gangs “against a backdrop of political, humanitarian and socioeconomic challenges”.

Haiti has seen years of declining security due to raging gang violence, with its political, economic and public health systems also in tatters. The country has been without a president since the incumbent, Jovenel Moise was assassination in July 2021.

Earlier last week, the United Nations reported that 5,000 homicides were recorded in Haiti last year, more than double that in 2022.

“I am appalled by the staggering and worsening level of gang violence devastating the lives of Haitians, in particular in Port-au-Prince,” said UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said in the report, adding “gang killings, kidnappings and sexual violence, notably against women and young girls, among other abuses, continue with widespread impunity”.

The UN report said that one in 10 police stations nationwide had been attacked through the year, while many of the police’s armoured vehicles were left inoperable after clashes with gang members, who often donned fake police uniforms to carry out kidnappings.