Samira
Illuminated Xalimo
https://news.sky.com/story/un-peace...hildren-in-haiti-mission-report-says-11889570
United Nations peacekeepers fathered hundreds of children during a controversial mission in Haiti, a report has found.
Researchers from the University of Birmingham and Ontario University spoke to 2,500 people in Haiti, asking them about their experience of the UN's Stabilisation Mission in Haiti (Minustah) which became one of the longest running peacekeeping mission
Researchers said a common theme in the stories was transactional sex, with peacekeepers paying young women and leaving after a baby was fathered.
Peacekeepers were frequently repatriated after a pregnancy was made known.
In one instance, a 14-year-old girl became pregnant after getting involved with a Brazilian soldier who was working as a peacekeeper. He told her he would help with the child, but left the country.
She has not received any support from him, the UN, or the Haitian state, and cannot afford to send her son, now four years old, to school, after being kicked out of her family home.
The report, published in The Conversation, found that a handful of the cases involving pregnancy came from rape.
The stories which emerged ranged from instances of sexual violence to accounts of relationships with soldiers, even those who cited rumours that some women wanted to date fairer skinned UN peacekeepers because fairer skinned children were seen as desirable.