“Defenseless old people”: 184 people killed in one weekend, acts of “unbearable cruelty”… what's happening in Haiti ?

At least 184 people were killed over the weekend in Haiti on the orders of a powerful gang leader.

At least 184 people were killed this weekend near the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince in atrocities orchestrated by a gang leader, the UN said Monday, with the office of the prime minister of this Caribbean country ravaged by violence by armed groups denouncing a “abject massacre”.

An “act of barbarity, of unbearable cruelty”

These killings were ordered by a “powerful gang leader” convinced that his son's illness had been caused by voodoo practitioners, according to the Haitian NGO Committee for Peace and Development (CPD).

“The Government of the Republic condemns in the strongest terms the abject massacre perpetrated on December 6 and 7, 2024 in Wharf Jérémie (Cité Soleil) by gang leader Micanor Altès, alias Wa Mikanò, and associates”, the office of Haitian Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé said in a statement on X on Monday.

“This act of barbarity, of unbearable cruelty, cost the lives of more than a hundred women and men, mainly defenseless old men”, continued the Prime Minister.

“At least 184 people have been killed in violence orchestrated by the leader of a powerful gang in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince”, said Volker Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, earlier.

“These latest killings bring the death toll in Haiti this year to a staggering 5,000 people,”, Türk said at a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland.

UN chief Antonio Guterres condemned the “terrifying” acts, calling on Haitian authorities to ensure that those responsible are “brought to justice,”, according to his spokesperson.

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In its press release, the Prime Minister's Office promised to “capture and bring to justice the perpetrators and accomplices of this unspeakable carnage”.

Haiti, a poor Caribbean country, has suffered from chronic political instability for decades. But he must also deal with a resurgence of gang violence, which controls 80% of the capital Port-au-Prince.

“His henchmen hunted down all the elderly and Voodoo followers”

According to the NGO CPD, the gang leader who orchestrated these murders “decided to cruelly punish all the elderly and Voodoo practitioners who, in his imagination, would be capable of sending a bad spell to his son.”

“The gang's soldiers were responsible for identifying the victims in their homes and taking them to the leader's stronghold to be executed”, added CPD, in a press release.

“His henchmen hunted down all the old people and Voodoo followers living in Wharf Jérémie (Cité Soleil district) between Friday evening and Saturday, and executed them before burning their bodies”, detailed Fritznel Pierre, head of the NGO, on Magik 9 radio on Monday.

He specified that “motorcycle taxi drivers who tried to flee with targeted people were also executed”. The toll is still provisional, he added, the area being “difficult to access”.

Cité Soleil is located west of the capital Port-au-Prince, on the seaside.

“My father, 76, was killed Friday evening around 10 p.m. The bandits set fire to his body”, a resident told AFP by telephone.

“The family can't even organize a burial for him since we couldn't recover the body”, lamented this witness, speaking on condition of anonymity, saying he feared for the lives of some relatives still there.

700,000 displaced by the violence

Gang violence, already endemic in Haiti, has worsened since February, when armed groups launched coordinated attacks in Port-au-Prince to force the resignation of then-Prime Minister Ariel Henry.

Backed by the UN and Washington, a multinational police support mission led by Kenya began deploying this summer, but the violence continues to escalate.

On the social network X, Sean Savett, spokesman for the White House National Security Council, urged the international community on Monday to join them “in providing immediate security assistance” to the multinational mission in Haiti and Haitian security forces.

There are now more than 700,000 people, half of them children, displaced by the ongoing violence across the country, according to figures from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in October.

Of African origin and a pillar of the country's culture, voodoo arrived in Haiti with African slaves. It was banned during the French colonial occupation (independence in 1804) and was not recognized as an official religion by the government until 2003.