Kenyan officers head home as the UN's Gang Suppression Force takes over

Hundreds of Kenyan police officers are returning home as the UN-authorized Gang Suppression Force takes over the international security mission in Haiti.

The handover marks the end of the Kenyan-led Multinational Security Support mission, which spent two years confronting armed groups while chronically short of funding and personnel. In September 2025, Security Council resolution 2793 authorized its transformation into the Gang Suppression Force, backed by a new UN Support Office providing logistics.

The GSF remains in an early phase, with roughly 1,000 personnel reported on the ground. The Security Council holds its 90-day briefing on Haiti this month, where the force’s deployment, oversight and conduct will be under scrutiny.

Beyond the gun

UN officials and analysts keep returning to the same point: security operations alone will not sustainably reduce the violence. Proposals for a Haitian-led disarmament, dismantlement and reintegration program, and a multi-partner trust fund to pay for it, are now on the Council’s table.

For communities that have lived through wave after wave of intervention, the measure of the GSF will not be its mandate on paper; it will be whether children can walk to school in Martissant.