▲ In Port-au-Prince, a child displaced by gang violence in Haiti sleeps in a school converted into a shelter.Photo Ap
Reuters and Ap
La Jornada Newspaper
Saturday, October 5, 2024, p. 20
Port-au-Prince., In Haiti, armed men who are part of the Gran Grif gang killed at least 70 people, including three babies, and forced nearly three thousand to flee when they devastated a city by shooting into a crowd with automatic rifles, reported yesterday the United Nations Organization (UN).
We are horrified by Thursday’s gang attacks in Pont-Sonde, in the Artibonite departmentUN spokesman Thameen Al-Kheetan said in a statement.
Another 16 were seriously injured in the attack, which took place early Thursday, including two members of the gang who were hit in an exchange of gunfire with the police.
The attackers set fire to at least 45 houses and 34 vehicles, forcing residents to flee their homes.
This hateful crime against defenseless women, men and children is not only an attack against the victims, but against the entire Haitian nation.declared the Prime Minister, Garry Conille, in X.
Local online television showed security forces entering Pont-Sonde, where a burned-out vehicle was in the middle of the road and bullet casings were piling up on the ground.
The residents are to blame. What happened in Pont-Sonde is the fault of the Statesaid the leader of the Great Grif, Luckson Elan, in an audio message on social networks, accusing the inhabitants of having remained passive while their soldiers They were killed by the police or vigilante groups.
Missing families
After killing dozens at the scene, they fled on foot through a nearby farm, killing everyone they encountered along the way, according to the group.
Entire families were decimateddeclared a witness, and many others they are still missing.
The Great Grif has also committed some of the highest levels of child recruitment in Haitiaccording to the Security Council of the United Nations Organization. They are accused of murders, rapes, mass kidnappings, robberies and destruction of property, among other acts of violence.
Armed gangs, which continue to control most of the capital, Port-au-Prince, seek to expand their hegemony while hunger, displacement and the deportation of Haitian migrants from neighboring countries increase.
The UN believes Haitian gangs are armed primarily with artifacts trafficked from the United States.
The police would be involved in some massacres. The leader of another gang, Jimmy Barbeque Cherizier, a former police officer, was accused by the UN of planning and participating in the massacre of 71 civilians in the port neighborhood of La Saline in 2018.
