Haiti enters new chapter of political turmoil and risk of violence

Haiti is no stranger to crisis. According to the World Bank, 60 percent of its 11-million population lives under the poverty line on less than USD 2.41 per day and suffers from daily power cuts. And the Caribbean nation has been hit by some extreme climate events in recent decades, such as the 2004 floods which killed over 5,000 people — or the devastating earthquake that left 300,000 dead in 2010. 

It is also home to a continuous cycle of political crisis, which entered a new chapter this week as political forces squabble over when the term of President Jovenel Moïse should end. The opposition — as well as a large part of the domestic political spectrum — claims his time in office expired on Sunday, while the president claims he still has one year to go.

February 7 was the sixth anniversary of the 2015 election, which was canceled and postponed on multiple occasions before Mr. Moïse won the vote on November 20, 2016. Between February 2015 and 2017, Haiti was ruled by a caretaker government. The dispute...