Haiti’s National Palace is under attack by armed men

The National Palace of Haiti is being attacked this Monday by armed men and several employees are trapped, leaving at least five police officers injured, one of them seriously.

At this time, intense shootings continue in the area and harsh clashes in the main public square of Port-au-Prince, Champs de Mars, very close to the National Palace, between gang members and the Police.

The members of the armed gangs, belonging to the ‘Live Together’ coalition, led by the powerful Jimmy Cherizier, alias ‘Barbecue’, managed to set fire to an armored vehicle of the National Police in the vicinity of the National Palace.

Never ending violence

Deaths, kidnappings and looting continue to be the order of the day in the capital of Haiti, where this Monday there were intense clashes and shootings between armed gangs and the Police, despite the fact that the levels of violence had decreased in recent days. after the escalation of tension experienced since the end of February.

In the Champ de Mars gardens, not far from the National Palace, in the heart of Port-au-Prince, shootings forced people to run in all directions to escape the gunfire, while activities were paralyzed.

According to local media, at least two people have died in the city’s metropolitan area.

Death scenes become commonplace

Furthermore, in the Pétion-Ville sector, in the hills of Port-au-Prince, four bodies were found this Monday morning, apparently riddled with gunshots.

Three of the bodies, as EFE was able to verify, were together face down, in the middle of a trail of blood, while the fourth was alone in an alley.

The neighbors come to see the scene, so common in Haiti that even children come to see what is happening.

And for at least two weeks, bodies have been found almost daily in Pétion-ville, the scene of clashes between gangs and the Police.

Despite all this, the current levels of violence are far from those recorded at the end of February and the beginning of last March, when armed groups intensified their attacks against institutions, companies and private properties, all in the absence of the Haitian Prime Minister, Ariel. Henry, who is still out of the country and whose removal from power the gangs demand.

In those days, massacres and attacks continued, such as the assaults on March 2 on the country’s two main prisons, the National Penitentiary and Croix-des-Bouquets, which allowed the escape of some 3,600 prisoners, many of them members and leaders of armed gangs.

The surroundings of the international airport were also not spared from the violence (there are still no flights) nor were the Presidential Palace or the Ministry of the Interior, which attempted to be attacked or set on fire by the gang members.

Alarm over the situation in Haiti

An example of the violence in Haiti are the figures provided last week by the UN, which described the situation as a “cataclysm”: more than 1,500 deaths at the hands of armed groups in the first three months of the year.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Haiti calls “terrible” the levels of violence at the hands of armed gangs, with its consequent effects in all areas: more than 5.5 million people need humanitarian aid to survive, the displaced exceed 362,000, more than 50% of the population has problems feeding themselves and the health system is on the verge of collapse.

Schools are not left out either and they have not opened their doors in the metropolitan area of ​​Port-au-Prince for a month now.

The crisis and insecurity generate concern everywhere and, thus, Pope Francis referred on Sunday, in his Easter message, to Haiti, a country for which he asked that “the violence that lacerates and bloodies cease as soon as possible and that it can progress.” on the path of democracy and fraternity.”

The UN, alarmed by the situation, will hold a debate in the Human Rights Council on Tuesday and, the following day, the Organization of American States (OAS) will discuss, in a regular meeting, the draft resolution ‘Support for the transition democracy in Haiti’. EFE