Thu 08 July 2021:
Four people suspected of assassinating Haiti’s President Jovenel Moïse have been killed in a shootout with the security forces, country’s police chief said on Wednesday, as the brazen assassination threatened to plunge the already impoverished, crisis-hit Caribbean nation deeper into chaos.
Two others have been detained, while some remaining suspects are thought to be still at large in the nation’s capital Port-au-Prince.
“They will be killed or captured,” police chief Leon Charles said.
Police General Director Leon Charles described the four people killed as “mercenaries” and said that security forces were locked in a fierce gun battle with the men who assassinated the president at his home overnight.
“We blocked them en route as they left the scene of the crime,” Charles said in televised comments. “Since then, we have been battling with them.”
“They will be killed or apprehended.”
Moise, a 53-year-old former businessman who took office in 2017, was shot dead and his wife, Martine Moise, was seriously wounded when heavily armed assassins stormed the couple’s home in the hills above Port-au-Prince at around 1am local time on Wednesday (05:00 GMT).
Speaking after the killing, interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph called for calm and declared a nationwide state of emergency.
The state of emergency, or “state of siege”, allows for the banning of gatherings and use of the military for police roles, along with other extensions of executive powers.
Antonio Guterres, the secretary-general of the United Nations, also condemned the assassination and stressed that “the perpetrators of this crime must be brought to justice,” according to a spokesman.
The UN Security Council meanwhile expressed deep shock and sympathy over Moise’s death before a closed-door meeting on Thursday, requested by the US and Mexico, to evaluate the situation.
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