PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (CMC)— The United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, on Monday announced a US$60 million humanitarian aid package to support Haitian people and alleviate the suffering caused by gang violence and the multidimensional crisis.

Thomas-Greenfield, who paid a one-day visit to the French-speaking Caribbean Community (Caricom) country, said that the aid would come through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

The funding will help USAID partners fill critical gaps in nutrition, food security, and shelter; improve water and sanitation services; provide limited market-based cash assistance to allow affected communities to purchase essential commodities, and support critical protection services for Haiti’s most vulnerable, including survivors of gender-based violence.

An estimated 5.5 million people in Haiti are in need of immediate humanitarian assistance amid a complex humanitarian crisis caused by civil unrest, disease, economic instability, and insecurity due to organised criminal groups.

These factors, combined with recurring shocks from natural disasters, including droughts, earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes have resulted in shortages of basic supplies and increased food insecurity throughout the country in recent years.

Continued violence has also cut off access to critical healthcare, forcing the closure of several hospitals and clinics, and continues to disrupt supply chains, elevate prices for staple foods, and decrease agricultural production of farmers.

Washington said that the funding announced on Monday “builds on earlier commitments this year of more than US$105 million, bringing the total USAID humanitarian support to the Haitian people this fiscal year to more than US$165 million”.

Last week, UN Women – the agency that champions gender equality said that displaced women face “unprecedented” level of insecurity and sexual violence in Haiti, saying that instability in the country is fuelling a spike in sexual violence against women and girls as armed gangs continue their assault on the population.

A new report by the agency reveals the dire living conditions and lack of security faced by some 300,000 displaced women and girls amid ongoing political instability, escalating gang violence and the threat of the current hurricane season.

Women and girls account for more than half of the 580,000 displaced people in Haiti, and the UN Women Rapid Gender Assessment highlights how makeshift camps, which lack basic necessities, are putting them at particular risk of sexual and gender-based violence.

UN Women said the survey was conducted in April in the six most populated and diverse displacement sites in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.

Meanwhile, the UN diplomat said that the US Department of Defense would provide a “substantial increase” in the number of armored vehicles to the Kenyan-led, UN-backed multinational mission to assist the Haitian National Police (PNH) to combat widespread gang violence.

“We know that progress is not linear. There will inevitably be setbacks and obstacles, and yet this mission has opened the door to progress,” Thomas-Greenfield said.