UN multi-disciplinary assessment team scheduled to arrive in Haiti on Tuesday

A United Nations multi-disciplinary team is scheduled to start arriving in Haiti tomorrow to assess what is needed for the stabilization force that the Security Council wants deployed within three months in the volatile Caribbean country, a UN spokesman said today.

Such teams do standard assessment work before the establishment of any UN peacekeeping mission, spokesman Fred Eckhard said at the daily briefing.

A Flash Appeal for humanitarian funds will be launched tomorrow morning and the head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Jan Egeland, would update journalists on the humanitarian situation in Haiti, he said.

The Special Adviser to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Reginald Dumas, would make his first visit to Haiti next week, overlapping with the assessment team, but focusing on broader political questions.

Mr. Dumas held talks with Jamaican Prime Minister Percival J. Patterson, the current chairman of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), in the latter part of last week, Mr. Eckhard said.

The Security Council has approved a resolution calling on the UN, CARICOM and the Organization of American States (OAS) to "promote the rebuilding of democratic institutions" and combat poverty in Haiti.

CARICOM and the OAS were the lead organizations trying to work out a compromise between then-Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his unarmed opposition before Mr. Aristide left Haiti.