Haiti\u2019s government says the country\u2019s gangs have crossed a \u201cred line\u201d after allegedly killing over 180 people over the weekend, after a gang leader reportedly blamed Voodoo adherents for his child\u2019s grave illness. <\/p>\n
A statement by the Haiti Prime Minister\u2019s office accused gang leader Micanor \u201cMikan\u00f2\u201d Alt\u00e8s and associates of carrying out the massacre on December 6 and 7, in impoverished Cit\u00e9 Soleil, in Haiti\u2019s capital city Port-au-Prince. <\/p>\n
Micanor ordered the killing of elderly residents in the Wharf J\u00e9r\u00e9mie area over suspicions that witchcraft had made his child sick, according to Haiti\u2019s National Human Rights Defense Network (RNDDH). <\/p>\n
\u201cOn Friday, December 6, Micanor shot and killed at least sixty (60) elderly individuals. On Saturday, December 7, he and his group killed at least fifty (50) more using machetes and knives. Despite his actions, his ill child passed away,\u201d it said. <\/p>\n
Citing sources in the area, Haiti\u2019s Committee for Peace and Development (CPD) also said the attack targeted \u201call elderly people and Voodoo practitioners who, in (Micanor\u2019s) imagination, would be capable of casting a bad spell on his son,\u201d and left the bodies of victims mutilated in the streets. <\/p>\n
At least 184 people were killed in the massacre, including an estimated 127 elderly men and women, the United Nations said. <\/p>\n
\u201cThese latest killings bring the death toll just this year in Haiti to a staggering 5,000 people,\u201d Human Rights Chief Volker T\u00fcrk said at a press conference Monday. <\/p>\n
Since the massacre, Wharf Je\u0301re\u0301mie remains \u201cunder an informal siege\u201d with elderly residents and Voodoo adherents still targeted by the broader Haitian gang alliance Viv Ansamn, according to RNDDH. <\/p>\n
Haiti\u2019s transitional government has promised to find and bring the perpetrators to justice. \u201cA red line has been crossed, and the State will mobilize all its forces to track down and annihilate these criminals,\u201d a statement from the prime minister\u2019s office said. <\/p>\n
For the past year, gangs under the Viv Ansamn banner have been ravaging Port-au-Prince, attacking state institutions including prisons, police stations and the city\u2019s international airport, and forcing hundreds of thousands of Haitian civilians to flee their homes. <\/p>\n
The escalating gang-driven chaos prompted the international community to send a multinational policing force to the Caribbean nation over the summer, but the so-called MSS has so far failed to curb Port-au-Prince\u2019s extreme violence. <\/p>\n
On Monday, UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres urged member states to provide more support to the multinational mission, and called for an investigation into the massacre. <\/p>\n
Haiti\u2019s National Police over the weekend had insisted that joint operations with the US-backed MSS were running smoothly, denying what it described as online rumors that the two forces were \u201cnot working in perfect harmony.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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