More than 20 suspected gang members were killed in Haiti’s capital on Tuesday after residents joined police to combat an attempted overnight attack, police said.
The suburb of Petion-Ville was closed on Tuesday, as residents barricaded the streets and mobilized, some with machetes and hammers in their hands, to protect the district from another
A Reuters reporter saw at least 25 bodies in the neighborhoods of Delmas, Canape Vert and Petion-Ville, where residents set fire to the bodies of suspected criminals under burning tires.
Deputy national police spokesman Lionel Lazarre told Reuters that around 30 people he described as gang members were fatally injured throughout the day.
“The population supported the Haitian National Police during these moments. They will continue to work side by side,” he said.
Lazarre previously told local radio that police had intercepted armed men traveling in vans, from which they seized weapons including Kalashnikov rifles.
Local resident Anara, who did not give her surname, told Reuters that men and women had been arriving since midnight “armed to the teeth” and that people did not know who had sent them.
“We gave them a clear answer,” she said. “We’re not going to give up on the area, we’re not going to leave.”
The “ancient” movement
Local newspaper Le Nouvelliste reported scenes of “bwa kale” in several parts of the capital, referring to one that began in April last year when residents lynched and set fire to suspected gang members in the absence of a police presence.
Haiti’s underfunded national police has laid off thousands of members in recent years.
The UN reported at least 149 cases of “bwa kale” between June and September this year.
However, human rights activists have warned about innocent people being caught up in vigilante killings, and the UN has reported cases of extreme violence committed against people accused of petty crimes.
International support
Haiti’s government in 2022 called for international support to help the national police combat powerful gangs, accused of mass sexual violence, kidnappings for ransom, extortion, child recruitment and blocking the flow of essential supplies.
The UN Security Council approved a support mission last October, but so far it has sent only a portion of what was promised. Haitian leaders pushed for it to be transformed into a peacekeeping mission to secure more funding.
The Security Council is due to meet this Wednesday (20) to discuss the
Meanwhile, Doctors Without Borders, one of Haiti’s main providers of free medical care, said it was halting its services in the capital due to rape and death threats from police.
Thousands have been killed in the gang conflict and more than 700,000 have been internally displaced, worsening food insecurity that has driven some 6,000 people into extreme levels of hunger.
