The Security Council voted unanimously today to extend the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Haiti for a year, saying the situation in the impoverished Caribbean nation still constitutes a threat to international peace and security despite recent progress, according to AP. The resolution adopted by the council will maintain the current mission's force level of about 9,000 troops and police. But the council agreed to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's recommendation to reconfigure the force so it can deploy rapidly and monitor remote locations, including border areas and the country's coastline. The U.N. chief said this could be done now since it is increasingly unlikely that U.N. peacekeepers will need to conduct large-scale security operations like those in the Cite Soleil area of Port Au Prince in 2007.
