Jan. 13 2010 - 9:25 am | 162 views | 0 recommendations | 3 comments

Thousands feared dead in Haiti earthquake; UN peacekeepers hit hard

By MP NUNAN

People displaced by last night's earthquake gather on Place Boyer in Petion-Ville to spend the night, following a major earthquake on January 13, 2010 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti (Frederic Dupoux/Getty)

Most of us have woken up to the news of the devastating earthquake to strike Haiti – a 7.0 magnitude tremor to strike off the coast near the capital Port-au-Prince.

Thousands of people are feared dead, buried in scores of decimated buildings. It will be days, if not longer, before a final number of dead and injured is determined.

The BBC and The New York Times are so far providing fairly comprehensive coverage of the nascent rescue operations, which will, as the hours go by, have to include looking at what crisis teams will do when one of Port-au-Prince’s main hospitals was destroyed in the quake.

The “news twist” in this tragedy is that Haiti is home to almost 10 thousand United Nations foreign peacekeepers and staffers – prompting concern in capitals for whom Haiti might not be on their regular news radar.

For the United Nations, this might be the worst single tragedy since 2003, when a suicide truck bomber blew up the UN mission in Iraq, killing 22 staffers, including mission chief Sergio Vieira de Mello.

And that comes at the end of a pretty lousy year for the United Nations. In 2009, at least 28 UN staff were killed in the line of duty.