Missing U.N. chief: Haiti was “at a turning point”

Veteran Tunisian Diplomat Hedi Annabi, chief of the U.N. stabilization mission in Haiti, is among those still missing in the wreckage of the U.N. headquarters in Port-au-Prince. Several official sources have reported him dead. The Wall Street Journal’s Dispatches blog reprints  recent comments Annabi made about Haiti’s upcoming elections, which would have been the first ...

By , a former associate editor at Foreign Policy.
574480_annabi2.jpg
574480_annabi2.jpg
(FILE) Picture taken on March 24, 2004, at UN headquarters in New York of Tunisian Hedi Annabi, then United Nations Assistant Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations, speaking before the Security Council about the situation in Afghanistan. Annabi, now Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General for Haiti (MINUSTAH), is believed dead after their headquarters collapsed in the huge quake measuring 7.0 which rocked the impoverished Caribbean nation of Haiti on January 13, 2010, France's Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Wednesday. AFP PHOTO/Stan HONDA (Photo credit should read STAN HONDA/AFP/Getty Images)

Veteran Tunisian Diplomat Hedi Annabi, chief of the U.N. stabilization mission in Haiti, is among those still missing in the wreckage of the U.N. headquarters in Port-au-Prince. Several official sources have reported him dead. The Wall Street Journal's Dispatches blog reprints  recent comments Annabi made about Haiti's upcoming elections, which would have been the first for the country's legislature. In the context of what's happened since, Annabi's remarks are just heart-breaking:

Veteran Tunisian Diplomat Hedi Annabi, chief of the U.N. stabilization mission in Haiti, is among those still missing in the wreckage of the U.N. headquarters in Port-au-Prince. Several official sources have reported him dead. The Wall Street Journal’s Dispatches blog reprints  recent comments Annabi made about Haiti’s upcoming elections, which would have been the first for the country’s legislature. In the context of what’s happened since, Annabi’s remarks are just heart-breaking:

“Success would allow the country to enter a virtuous circle where stability and development are mutually reinforcing,” Mr. Annabi said.

“Haiti is today at a turning point in its history,” Mr. Annabi said on Jan. 7. “We saw the hope of a new departure emerge on the horizon in 2009. It is now up to the Haitians, and only the Haitians, to transform this hope into reality by working together in the greater interests of their country.”

As always, in the wake of such events, it’s lamentable that the international community can mobilize millions of dollars in aid after a disaster stikes, but for years allowed the country to fall into a state of disrepair that made the disaster so much worse. Here’s hoping that this time the country stays on the international agenda after the rubble is cleared. Annabi’s successors are going to have their work cut out for them. 

Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating

Tag: Haiti

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