Hundreds of Haitians have marched from the United Nation's base in the capital, Port-au-Prince, to the country's parliament, demanding compensation and justice for the victims of the cholera epidemic blamed on the global body's peacekeepers.

The protesters said they want the UN to be held accountable, but the organisation denies any responsibility.

Brian Concannon, director of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti and one of the lawyers who has filed claims against the UN on behalf of cholera victims, put the blame on the UN.

Concannon told Al Jazeera: "The proximate cause of the epidemic are the UN and they are to blame."

The protest was staged a day after Bill Clinton, the UN's special envoy to Haiti, said that a member of the global organisation's peacekeeping force was probably responsible for bringing cholera to the Caribbean country.

But Clinton added that the peacekeeper may not have known that he was doing so.

 

Clinton made the comment after he was asked whether he agreed with a statement by Susan Rice, the US Ambassador to the UN, about holding accountable those who brought cholera to Haiti.

Studies have suggested that peacekeepers from Nepal probably introduced the disease to Haiti for the first time, months after the January 2010 earthquake.