Thousands of peasant farmers gathered in the main plaza in Hinche, a city in Haiti's Central Plateau, on June 4 to protest a donation of about 476 metric tons of hybrid seeds from the Monsanto Company, a US-based biotechnology multinational that produces genetically modified organisms (GMO). Agriculture Minister Joanas Gué admitted on May 12 that the government was accepting Monsanto's offer, supposedly intended to help the country recover from a devastating Jan. 12 earthquake. The seeds are not GMO, but critics say they are still a "poisoned present."

Edmond Mulet, acting head of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), a 9,000-member international military force, issued an apology on May 25 for an incursion by a group of Brazilian soldiers the day before into the Faculty of Ethnology at the State University of Haiti (UEH) in downtown Port-au-Prince. The soldiers arrested a student, Frantz Mathieu Junior, claiming he threw stones at them; they released him later the same day. Students responded to the invasion by burning tires and throwing rocks.

On May 25 US president Barack Obama signed into law a measure intended to promote renewed development of the low-wage apparel assembly industry in Haiti. The Haiti Economic Lift Program (HELP) Act of 2010, introduced in Congress on April 28 by a bipartisan group of representatives and senators, extends through 2020 several existing laws giving tariff preferences for apparel stitched in Haiti: the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act (CBTPA) and the Haitian Hemispheric Opportunity through Partnership Engagement Acts of 2006 (HOPE Act) and 2008 (HOPE II).

Gun battles raging in the Jamaican capital have left more than 60 people dead, hospital sources said May 25, as troops fanned out across the city hunting for accused drug kingpin Christopher "Dudus" Coke. Police put the death toll at 27, but Prime Minister Bruce Golding admits the actual figure may be much higher. "The government deeply regrets the loss of lives of members of the security forces, and those of innocent law abiding citizens who were caught in the cross fire," Golding said. Hospital workers said the victims were mostly civilians.

On May 16 European and Latin American social movements meeting in Madrid adopted a statement denouncing the US and European response to a devastating Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti as "the utilization of the humanitarian alibi with the sole goal of defending US geopolitical, economic and military interests, with the complicity of the European Union (EU)." The groups were meeting in the Fourth Assembly of Enlazando Alternativas (EA4, "Linking Alternatives"), held May 14-18 on the eve of a May 18 trade summit of EU and Latin American and Caribbean leaders in the Spanish capital. Haiti, which signed an economic partnership agreement with the EU in 2009, was expected to attend the summit.

On May 18 union leaders in the All Puerto Rico for Puerto Rico Coalition claimed success for a 24-hour general strike they held that day to support students striking against a proposed $100 million cut in the budget of the University of Puerto Rico (UPR). The unionists said their members had shut down nine of the country's 10 government centers, along with port operations in San Juan. Marcos Rodríguez-Ema, secretary for Gov. Luis Fortuño, denied the unionists' claims, saying government offices were operating normally. The Cuban wire service Prensa Latina reported that traffic in the capital was greatly reduced, while the Spanish wire service EFE called the situation normal.

Running battles between police and gunmen of the Shower Posse gang turned part of Jamaica's capital Kingston into a warzone on May 24, with reports of explosions and civilian casualties. Two police were killed the previous day as police moved in to arrest accused kingpin Christopher "Dudus" Coke for extradition to the US. The confirmed death toll has now reached three, as a soldier was killed breaking through street barricades in the Tivoli Gardens neighborhood. National Security Minister Dwight Nelson said on national television that he had received reports of several civilian deaths and desperate pleas from residents pinned inside buildings by gunfire. Police and soldiers have begun house-to-house searches for Dudus Coke.

The UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) announced May 22 that it has launched an investigation into the shootings of dozens of prisoners during a jail riot in Les Cayes, the country's third city, following the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake. Haitian police had blamed fighting among inmates for the deaths. Thousands of prisoners escaped from jails in Haiti in the chaos after the quake that killed more than 200,000.