Children make up half of Haiti’s gangs. They’re about to face a new foreign force. | CNN

As a new multinational force musters in Haiti, its foreign police and soldiers could soon find themselves face-to-face with hundreds of children. Children make up about 50% of armed groups in the country, experts estimate. In 2024 alone, at least 302 children were “recruited and used” by gangs across the capital, Port-au-Prince, according to the latest UN secretary general’s report on children and armed conflict. Most were used in combat roles, it said. Traces of this phenomenon can be spotted on gangs’ social media. Last week, during a gang attack that left dozens dead in Artibonite, Haiti’s agricultural heartland, one video appeared to show a round-cheeked young boy waving a rifle and mugging for the camera. Behind him, an older man repeatedly fired into the distance. That same week, the first installment of new Gang Suppression Force reinforcements arrived in Haiti, according to the force’s X account.  Initial plans call for the force, authorized by the UN Security Council, to eventually field about 5,500 personnel to work with Haiti’s police and armed forces. “With the GSF operations, we anticipate that many children will be exiting the gangs.