Kenya, US sign defense agreement ahead of planned Haiti deployment

KENYA – Kenya and the United States (U.S) have signed a defense agreement that will see the East African nation get resources and support for security deployments as it is poised to lead a multi-national peacekeeping mission to Haiti to combat gang violence.

Kenya’s Defense Minister, Aden Duale, and U.S. Defense Secretary, Lloyd Austin, signed the accord at a meeting in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi on Monday.

Africanews indicated that the the agreement guided the countries’ defense relations for the next five years as the war in East Africa against the al-Qaeda linked al-Shabab extremist group intensifies.

Austin thanked Kenya for volunteering to take the leadership of the Haiti multi-national force and reiterated that the U.S government would work with Congress to secure the US$100 million in funding that it pledged on the sidelines of the United Nations (U.N) General Assembly.

Kenya in August pledged to send 1,000 security officers to Haiti to combat gang violence in a mission that is pending the U.N Security Council’s formal approval but has received support from the U.N. and U.S.

Duale said his country was ready to deploy to Haiti and cited Kenya’s “very long history of global peacekeeping” in Kosovo, neighboring Somalia and Congo.

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