Haiti’s primary and secondary road networks are also critical vectors for the movement of legal and illicit goods from the coasts to the Dominican Republic and from Dominican Republic into Haiti. The principal road corridors consist of the RN1 running north-south from Cap Haitien to Port-au-Prince; the RN2 that that connects Port-au-Prince to Les Cayes in the south of the country; and the RN3 that stretches west to east from Port-au-Prince through Mirebalais and Hinche to the frontier with Dominican Republic (see Map 1). Haiti also has many secondary road corridors of variable condition and more seldom, if ever, monitored by authorities. Several gangs presently control key access points to the RN1, RN2, and RN3, particularly junctures connected to Port-au-Prince. From there they can control territory, conduct kidnapping operations and extract illegal rents from passing vehicles.
Haitian and international authorities are preoccupied with how gangs have expanded their influence over access points to critical infrastructure and public facilities, presumably to strengthen their negotiating position with government authorities.84 Gang federations such as the G9, for example, blockaded access to ports and restricted access to gasoline and diesel supplies, while calling for the resignation of high-level public officials.85 Other groups such as the 5 Seconds gang have periodically controlled sections of the RN1, blocked port Latifo, Cimenterie and Moulins d’Haiti,
occupied Haiti’s main courthouse, and even freed inmates from Titanyen prison.86 Meanwhile, large gangs such as 400 Mawozo have controlled key sections of the RN3 on route to the Dominican Republic, while also facilitating drugs and firearms shipments, robbing merchandise, selling black market fuel and choking local economies.87
Airports and clandestine runways are another means of shifting legal and illegal products in and out of Haiti. Haiti has long served as a transit hub for the movement of cocaine, cannabis and to a lesser extent, heroin and amphetamines to the US and Dominican Republic. Haiti’s official airport hubs are Port-au-Prince and Cap-Haïtien, with intermittent airline services available for Hinche, Jacmel, Jérémie, Les Cayes and Port-au-Paix (see Map 1). There are several other runways located from Anse-à-Galets and L'île de la Gonâve to Port-Salut, though few of these are currently operational.8
UN report