Canada’s military mission training foreign troops bound for Haiti | Exclusive

Inside an old prison compound just outside Kingston, Jamaica, what looks and sounds like a major military operation. In fact. It’s a training exercise, the culmination of four weeks of military training. For troops from three Caribbean countries, Jamaica, Bahamas and Belize, under the guidance of Canadian Forces, mostly from Val Karche, Quebec, and all of it with one daunting goal, to get into Haiti, to try to begin to bring order to a place that’s now all but overrun by paramilitary gangs. The Canadians came to Jamaica focused on a number of aspects, chief among them instructing first aid in combat zones. The goal is to create a team from the Caribbean that would support troops from Kenya who lead the mission into Haiti. On this final day of training, Canadians kept careful watch on how it all played out. So too government and military planners from throughout the region. It has been phenomenal. I think it has demonstrated the Canadian government’s very real commitment to ensuring that it is a part of creating change in Haiti. But, says Jamaica’s foreign affairs minister, more is needed from Canada and other countries before these troops could deploy. What we do need is the financial support and the equipment support from our larger developed countries. To make sure that they are force effective when they deploy, and for the Caribbean troops, that’s a key factor on timing and so the question of when they’ll go into Haiti remains unclear, the head of the Canadian contingent here told CBC News. Whatever the future holds, this work is done, I feel good about it. It is absolutely a tremendous commitment by Canada and we delivered on that commitment. And Paul, Haiti has seen foreign intervention in the past with mixed results. What’s different about this mission? Yeah, well, you know, I use that word intervention in my conversation with Jamaica’s foreign affairs minister today. And she immediately pushed back on it. And she said by design, this is not that, that when the troops do go in, it’ll be strictly to come to the aid of Haiti’s police, who, as it stands, are overwhelmed and outgunned by those gangs. Haiti is spiraling. And again, so when the troops go in, we’re told it’ll be simply to help Haitian authorities try to reverse that. Nothing more. Paul. Thank you. Paul Hunter reporting from Kingston, Jamaica.