SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP) — U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau is scheduled to meet with officials in the Dominican Republic on Saturday as part of an official two-day trip that included a stop in neighboring Haiti.
The talks are focused on mutual economic commercial interests and regional priorities including security, according to a U.S. government statement.
The Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, has become a key ally of the U.S. government.
President Luis Abinader said last November that he would allow the U.S. to operate inside restricted areas in the Caribbean country to help in its fight against drug trafficking.
Landau met on Friday with Haiti’s Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé, as well as national police officials and a U.N.-backed gang suppression force.
“Security, stability, and prosperity in Haiti is in both our nations’ interests,” Landau wrote on X.
While Landau met with high-ranking officials in Port-au-Prince, three police officers and a civilian were killed in the country’s central region of Artibonite on Friday during an operation to seize back control of an area that has been under siege by powerful gangs.
Haiti’s National Police said it sent reinforcements to Artibonite to help officers fighting heavily armed men.
The Gran Grif gang, which is mounting a campaign of terror in the region, is accused of killing dozens of people in the past year.