Donors pledge $750m aid to Haiti

July 26, 2006 – (BBC) International donors have pledged $750m (£407m) in aid to the Caribbean nation of Haiti in an effort to help economic recovery over the next year. The decision came after a one-day meeting of donors in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.

The gathering included delegates from the World Bank, the European Union, and the Inter-American Development Bank. The aid is much more than the $540m (£293m) the Haitian government had asked for to stabilise the economy.

The money is part of an overall plea for $7bn (£3.8bn) to help pay for security, road building, health service and agricultural improvements and the promotion of institutional reform. The government of Rene Preval, who won elections in February, also wants to upgrade the electricity grid and telecommunications and help promote tourism.

Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, is the poorest nation in the Americas. There has been fears rising violence in the capital could drag the country back into the chaos of 2004, when former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was overthrown. "If we don't get the assistance the country needs, we will go back to the chaos we had before," Haitian Foreign Minister Reynald Clerisme told the Associated Press news agency.

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5215490.stm