Videos of the events show men running towards police officers with their hands up for protection, as bursts of automatic weapons are heard.
Members of heavily armed gangs engaged in street fighting in the center of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, on Wednesday, blocking main avenues and the municipal market.
Videos of the events at the center show men running towards police officers with their hands up for protection, as bursts of automatic weapons are heard.
The fresh outbreak of violence follows clashes in the suburbs that killed, injured and left hundreds of people “disappeared” earlier this month.
A cathedral in Port-au-Prince caught fire and was damaged before firefighters could put out the flames. The cause of the fire is not yet known, however it is believed to be connected to the street fights of the thugs.
Amid the gunfire, inmates at a penitentiary in the center of the Haitian capital broke out of their cells and gathered in the courtyard where they had made a failed escape attempt, Inspector General of Prisons Pierre René Francois told a Haitian radio station.
Heavy gunfire was also heard in Cite Soleil.
In this run-down district, the UN announced a few days ago, more than 471 people were killed, injured or disappeared from July 8 to 17, amid fighting between gangs seeking to expand the territories where they impose their own law.
In May, clashes between gangs in the capital region had already claimed the lives of some 150 people, according to human rights defenders.
In the past two years, the gangs, which operate with widespread impunity, have spread beyond the slums of the Haitian capital and have notably multiplied kidnappings for ransom.
As police, faced with shortages of personnel and equipment, are unable to regain control, gangs have, since early June, launched attacks on key institutions in Port-au-Prince, such as the courthouse or the headquarters of the ports authority.
With its legitimacy increasingly in question, Haiti’s prime minister, Ariel Henri, has so far remained silent on the outbreak of violence.
Haiti remains mired in the political crisis that emerged after the most recent elections, which were held in late 2016. The assassination of President Jovenel Moise by a group of mercenaries inside his home on July 7, 2021 further complicated the situation.
RES-EMP
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