South American countries pledge $300 million in aid to Haiti

South American nations Tuesday pledged $300 million in aid to help Haiti dig out from a crippling earthquake that left the capital and several cities in ruin.

UNASUR, a group of 12 independent South American countries, will create a $100-million fund to help finance rebuilding of schools, hospitals, and — as Haitian President Rene Preval said during an emergency summit in Ecuador — roads to help reverse the historic neglect of rural Haiti.

At the same time, Preval stressed the continued need for urgent help. “I have to return this evening to 1 million homeless people in the streets. Who has tents?” he impatiently asked the leaders and representatives at the Quito summit.

Haiti needs 200,000 tents and the rainy season is approaching, he added.

Along with promising additional temporary shelters, the group pledged to forgive Haiti’s debt and free the Caribbean nation’s goods from duties. They promised to jointly seek a $200-million, 15- to 20-year loan from the Inter-American Development Bank at a preferential interest rate to help fund rebuilding.

“We will move ahead so that the concrete accords regarding the $100-million fund hopefully will be signed in Cancun,” Mexico, at a meeting later this month, Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa said during a news conference after the summit.

The bank has already signaled its willingness to provide the loan and bilateral aid by individual countries will continue, he added.

Haiti’s Latin American neighbors were among the first to respond to its aid needs, with Venezuela landing an aircraft full of aid hours after the earthquake and committing to build housing in Leogane, its envoy told McClatchy Newspapers. Mexico sent in a hospital ship and supplies. Peru brought doctors and medical supplies. Cuba flew in doctors and used Haitian medical students studying there to assist victims.

Meanwhile, volunteers from the Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola, were the first to provide hot meals on the ground, and President Leonel Fernandez surprised Preval and Haitians when his helicopter landed unannounced at the government base. The Dominican Republic also opened its borders to allow aid and injured victims to cross easily.

The financial pledges at the Quito summit will be divided according to gross domestic product, making Brazil, which accounts for close to half the subcontinent’s GDP, carry by far the largest individual load of the summit’s pledge.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has pledged $205 million in bilateral aid and will double the number of its U.N. troops to 2,600. Countries such as Argentina, Chile, Ecuador and Peru also have soldiers in the 6-year old, 9,000-strong peacekeeping force.

After a Jan. 29 trip to Haiti, Correa, the acting head of UNASUR, called Tuesday’s emergency meeting to discuss the coordination of aid by South American nations. The group will also review how to provide fertilizers, seeds, tree seedlings, and long-term technical support.

The massive presence of the United States on the island, which has led to criticism from both Brazil and France, the former colonial power, was largely ignored at the Quito meeting.

At the same time, leaders stressed the need for strengthening the Haitian government amid a massive presence of industrialized countries’ non-governmental organizations.

The summit also marked the first trip to Ecuador by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe since a cross-border raid on a rebel camp just inside its neighbor’s border on March 1, 2008. The ground and air attack, which killed a top leader of the Marxist FARC, Colombia’s biggest rebel group, led Correa to sever top-level diplomatic relations, and both sides exchanged recriminations until a quiet deal was reached to name charges d’affaires late last year.