Mon 04 March 2024:
Haiti’s government has declared a state of emergency and enforced a curfew following an outbreak of gang-led violence over the weekend that resulted in the escape of thousands of convicts after assaults on the country’s two largest prisons.
Thousands of inmates escaped from a prison in Haiti on Sunday after armed gangs stormed the facility.
Gang members raided the Croix des Bouquets Prison in the capital Port-au-Prince, leading to clashes with security forces.
During the conflict, 3,600 inmates escaped, while 12 were killed.
The Haitian government issued a statement saying that criminal organizations attacked the prison in the early hours of the morning, and as a result of police resistance, armed individuals fled the area.
There were reportedly 17 Colombian citizens in the prison, and the Colombian government is in contact with Haitian authorities.
According to local media, in addition to the deaths of four police officers in the attacks over the past three days, dozens of people were also injured.
The 72-hour state of emergency went into immediate effect as the government said it would set out to find the killers, kidnappers and other violent criminals it said it had escaped in the attacks.
The curfew will be in force from 6pm (23:00 GMT) until 5am (10:00 GMT).
“The police were ordered to use all legal means at their disposal to enforce the curfew and apprehend all offenders,” said a statement from Finance Minister Patrick Boisvert, who is acting as prime minister while Ariel Henry is overseas trying to salvage support for a United Nations-backed security force to stabilise the country in its conflict with increasingly powerful crime groups.
Thousands of people have been staging protests for some time, demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Ariel Henry and have frequently clashed with the police.
Henry, who became prime minister in 2021 after Moise’s assassination, was supposed to step down by early February, but told a regional summit in Guyana before travelling to Kenya that he would only hold elections by August 2025 once the situation was more stable.
The last elections took place in 2016.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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