17 Jan, 2010, Xinhua, PORT-AU-PRINCE, china

On Sunday the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon arrived in Port-au-Prince, the capital of Caribbean nation Haiti that which was destroyed by a Tuesday quake that registered 7.3 on the Richter scale. Ban had come to see the first hand effects of the catastrophe so as to show the solidarity to Haiti’s citizens and to the UN’s workers, as well as to help boost the speed of aid distribution in the nation.

He began the visit with an inspection of the UN headquarters in Port-au-Prince that had collapsed in the quake killing both Hedi Annabi, the UN’s special representative in Haiti, and his deputy Luiz Carlos da Costa alongside dozens of UN staff. Annabi, a Tunisian who led the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti was found dead on Saturday by the Chinese rescue workers in the ruins of the building.

Ban also met the quake survivors telling them that the rescue teams and international aid are being accelerated. During the conference, Haiti’s Prime Minister, Jean-Max Bellerive estimated that around 100,000 people had died due to the quake and that more than 90 percent of the nation’s buildings are damaged.

At a separate Sunday meeting with Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, Ban proposed a special UN-backed European Union mission to Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with former Spanish colony the Dominican Republic. The UN is evaluating the opening of a humanitarian corridor linking the Dominican Republic and Haiti so as to boost the number of sources of aid.