Who to save Haiti? Gangs take over in America's poorest nation • FRANCE 24 English

any volunteer to save Haiti's 11 million citizens, the

gangs

that invaded the country while the Prime Minister had gone to Kenya to seal a deal for an Inter

nation

al Police Force. Arieli now stuck in Puerto Rico. The country has been without a president since 2021 in the assassi

nation

of Janel Muiz in what At the time seemed like a new low for the

poorest

nation in the United States, now, although it is getting worse, it seems that Haiti is really a list of leaders. US and UN Caribbean leaders are struggling to find an alternative to the gang rule of people like the famous Jimmy.

Sherier, aka BBQ, and if Washington is getting tired of Ariel H, what's the alternative? Our panel also reacts to the exclusive report we are about to show you from partner station France, filmed on the streets of Po before last weekend's mass escape by The Gangs. in the France 24 debate we ask who will save Haiti and we will be joined shortly from the capital of Haiti by Vidor Miron, editor and head of the news website aibo post uh ranata seura is deputy director of the program for Latin America and the Caribbean of the international agency crisis group welcome to the program thank you very much lawyer and T is the former president of the M diti Cultural Center here in Paris thank you for being with us thank you for inviting me and we are delighted to welcome Floran de mu video journalist senior correspondent of the public television channel France, you and the Mar France 24 alumnus, who has also honored us with your presence, we will see your report in a moment, thank you both for being with us, thank you, your reactions on the hashtag. debate f24 um let me start with you and uh um, what are people telling you in the last 24 hours that you've talked to in Haiti? that the situation is expensive, literally, that people live in fear, but that there seems to be a proposal for a way out of the current chaos and I could talk about it, yes, we will ask them about that about how to break this impasse first, although as promised in that exclusive report filmed by Floron and Mark, it is a story read by Lauren Bane a violent scene unfolds in Hades Capital Porto the police were able to stop an attempted kidnapping a man is seriously injured his wife screams in despair she is a collateral victim trapped in The crossfire The police gunshots only add to the chaos Three men are arrested They are suspected of being involved in the kidnapping of a truck driver in Haiti Anyone can be kidnapped and held for ransom The man is still alive and they ran him away in this taxi we didn't used to hear shootings around here normally it was the center today extortion and kidnappings have become a common trade to finance the

gangs

since the assassination of the Haitian president in 2021 the country has sunk even further in political chaos and insecurity 80% of the capital today is controlled by criminal groups Haitian police officers try to regain control of parts of the city in a tank riddled with bullets.

This elite unit prepares to confront a gang that is making its way through Marani, a neighborhood west of Porto PR. The residents here are desperate. The area has been occupied for some time by armed men. The civilians were here to put them out of their misery. Their mission is to re

take

a slaughterhouse occupied by a gang. The team is guided by a drone as they advance towards the building. The tension is high. Shots are fired. police enter a narrow alley when they hear someone the man seen running is shot by the police although he is not visibly armed for just being in the area he is considered an accomplice of the M gang the team decides to withdraw The slaughterhouse will remain in the hands of the gang we eliminated a gang member he was in an alley I killed him we have to retreat in Haiti's brutal territorial war more than 13 people are murdered every day the belir gang controls this neighborhood located in the heart of Porto Prance The lookouts always They are guarding the front line here it is okay it is safe but definitely not up there we can only go a little further this man moves to a viewpoint closer to the front this is the neighborhood of solino look at his flag it is his base at the end of the street it is Territory enemy, Bell Gang has been trying to gain control of this area.

There's a guy who rears his head from time to time. I'm going to shoot him because gangs gaining new territory means getting more funding through extortion. In this footage, both parts. The Selenos faced off, helped by the police. They are seen fighting against the Belair. The young members of the Belir gang show their territory, arm to the teeth, calling themselves the 103 zombies who live or die in the service of their boss in the Battle of Selino. We were ready. to die that is all we have in this country the majority of young people who have not yet left Haiti are like us they

take

up arms we are the 103 zombies who run this country on social media they brandish their wealth and luxurious lifestyles achieved Through criminal activities, some are even seen with a couple thousand dollars, they patrol the streets with a bottle of rum in one hand and a gun in the other.

This gun is like we see it, drink rum on the other side. from the street the selino neighborhood coveted by the belir gang one of the residents shows where the two gangs clashed they burned everything is war everything is destroyed a large community of police live in selino along with other local residents until now they have managed to defend themselves from the Bell gang but the combat is fierce there are neighbors who stay there all night the community brigades is a form of self-defense to prevent people from leaving the neighborhood authorities do not come here to see the damage abandoned by the state the population has had to fend for herself with more than 300,000 displaced people more than half of them are children this woman had to flee her home in a hurry while she was pregnant in Haiti we are not valued we are thirsty we are hungry we are being shot we are in need, the country is Finished, we need a solution because it's really bad.

Last year, the UN approved a multinational police mission to quell the violence. The leader of the initiative is Kenya, which agreed to deploy 1,000 officers to Haiti, a small ray of hope. for millions of Haitians, yes, that report by Floran Deo and Mark the Shon, let me start with you. Fon, you guys have been to a lot of different places. They stayed in Haiti for a week. Was it what you expected? Not at all, that was the first time for me, so I didn't know what to expect. I mean, of course, before performing a task, you read a lot of things about the history of the country and what was happening there, but as soon as we arrived we realized that the situation was total, yes, that attempt to kidnap you, you filmed it almost by chance, yeah, I mean, we were riding our bikes, going back to the hotel, we heard some good gunshots and we came to a situation where there was a crowd. of a lot of people and people shouting so that you don't understand the situation I mean of course and then we got closer and we saw that this guy was lying bleeding and his wife was screaming crying I mean it was quite intense yes those um children their children uh who drink rum to take away their nerves, They have older people behind the scenes that give them some idea of ​​who they are, yeah, well we actually had a date with their boss the day we were with them, but he was sick. so we couldn't meet with them, so yeah, there's a boss for every gang, and I mean the guy who carried the guns and who goes on the front line, they really follow what the bus says and, uh, it's the Same thing in all the gang controlled neighborhoods so they're actually soldiers going about their nonsense and a word about the police we saw there, how overwhelmed they are, we see them come in, maybe there's a guy who got shot, yeah, that.

Is he like an observer? We don't know exactly because when we were there we understood that a guy was shot, but we didn't know who it was because the guy in front just shot him and then we saw the photo and we saw that it was just a guy that you had put body cameras on. , oh yeah, on the commander, the one who shot the young man, and then we saw that this guy wasn't carrying a gun, so we said okay, uh. the police can shoot like that at people who don't have weapons, uh, but the situation there was so dangerous that you can somehow understand it, uh, but what this guy was doing there, we don't know, I mean, was he an observer? ?

The gang was just some guy passing through the screen because some people live nearby. We don't know this. I mean, you can see with this. I'm talking about the SWAT team when they put their boots on the ground. I mean no. Really confident because you know you can get ambushed, I mean there's no one around so they just walk and you can feel them very tense because you can get ambushed at any moment so this guy was like he's coming. Yes, this neighborhood was really a trap for them. Okay, now we can move on to viola.

Editor-in-chief of Aibo Post news website. Thank you for being with us here in the France 24 debate. What we just saw. Illustrated. In that report, how long has it been like this in the Haitian capital? Well, I think what we just saw in this report is the latest example of Haiti sinking further into chaos, but at the same time it is not a new story. uh you probably know some of the difficult situations that we've seen, but we have to remember that you know in 2021 the Haitian president was the leader of the country at the time he was assassinated in the privacy of his bedroom and a couple of you know. days, I think weeks before he was killed, you know, dozens of people were killed in the capital, including, you know, a human rights defender and a journalist, so let me get this straight, to clarify.

V uh 2010, there's that uh hor Horrible earthquake, uh, what's the point of gangs actually taking over Paul PR? Well, Haiti has a gang problem, this gang problem, you know, goes back years, politicians and also, uh, people in the business sector, you know, historically use gangs to get ahead. interest and in addition to that, you also have a problem of arms trafficking which, as you know, is caused by the lack of policies and you also know the deficiencies of the Haitian State. Most of the weapons in Haiti right now that are involved in these crimes can be traced.

You know, in the US and these are numbers that come from the US Department of Justice, so back in the day, say, seven or eight years, let's say the last two presidents that we had, Jvel Miz was assassinated, but his predecessor, who he chose became president uh under um um uh uh Michelle martii uh the situation, you know, sank further, uh, into more chaos, um and today we are, you know, witnesses of a total collapse of the rest of the institutions that, you know, are still standing. There's um, I mean, we talked about, you know, the largest prison in Haiti, you know, being attacked by gangs and my own reports show that, um, the police officers did not resist, you know a lot, uh, when the gang. they surrounded the place um and in the course of they fled um they left them open and and and you know um people, including some of the worst criminals um left the place more and more in the police, that's something that people don't really talk about.

That is an all-time low. I have sources in the Haan National Police today telling me that you know, dozens are choosing to stay home or, in a sense, protect themselves because I mean, kings are all-powerful, right? This corroborates what Florón de Mo just said about the tension felt by that Patrol who followed a serious rat listening to VOR. You think back to January, when the entire world was stunned when drug gangs in Ecuador staged a mass prison break. However, this is generally another. It's definitely on a completely different scale and I think the international community was preparing a response to the kind of violence that we had been seeing in Haiti, as has been said for years, but particularly on the rise since the assassination of President Moiz, but really the situation It is changing dramatically by the hour and from the gangs attacking the police stations, to the prisons and to the airport, we are really seeing a very, very different stage of what this multinational mission that was mentioned in the report should be reaching.

It is a completely different situation than what Kenyans had signed up for and will require an accelerated response from the broader international community. Why did the international community not react in 2021 after the assassination of the president? Well, the international community has reacted. In some ways, and you know, the creation of this UN approved multinational Support Mission being led by Kenya is that the response has been quite slow. I think part of the difficulty has been this very difficult history of international intervention in Haiti. which has not always been resolved well and the Haitians, for understandable reasons, have requested that whatever happens has to be directed by the Haitians themselves.

At the heart of the problem has been a difficulty increate a transitional government that really has the support of the majority. of the people and without that government, without a transitional government that truly reflects all Haitians, it has been difficult for the international community to give the Haitian National Police the support it needs. It is very understandable that many countries said "we don't do it." I don't want to send troops into a country if the population is going to see them as simply an instrument to keep a man in power who is highly illegitimate, so it took a lot of back and forth to try to put together this mission that, hopefully , will be successful. get to Haiti early, but also try to create a political agreement that really responded to the needs of all Haitians and Prime Minister Henry, we have to say, has not been very cooperative on that front so far.

We will have to see how the next few days evolve in this regard when, as we are hearing on the ground, a new political pact is brewing in Haiti that will hopefully create a transitional government that can provide full support for this mission to arrive in the following days. Yes, I promised that we would talk about the proposal to try to form some agreement. some kind of legitimate governance for Haiti to welcome the international community before it comes to that, although we have many spectators in Kenya watching us. Do you see the Kenyan police coming to Haiti under the current circumstances?

I think that is what Kata just said is very true, it means that the Haitian people do not want any country to impose on them a solution that they would like, of course, they will need, I think, the support of the international community, but this has They now find themselves in a situation where they are experiencing the darkest hours of their history after an earthquake that is darker than I mean. Since then, a president has been assassinated in his country and nothing has really happened since then except commitments that an interim provision of government would be uh. take power until the elections until they left, he would leave and then organize elections that are not there, so of course this is generating a huge crisis because if you do not fulfill the commitment that you made, how is it going for a population that do you need it all? water electricity food now security the population in that in your in your in your very interesting documentary uh there was a woman saying uh we we we we are defenseless we need everything and more than that we live in fear because there is a there No, there is no security, no there is stability.

This was filmed a few weeks ago back then. Did you go to see the Prime Minister's office? Did you have the feeling that there was someone in charge? Not really, I mean, nothing works except uh him, I mean yeah, except arel h, I mean the government, parliament is not working, nothing is working, there is no president, uh, he's the only one, so , except Ariel H, nothing exists now in it, but what we are seeing now, uh, we have heard about. when we were in um in heti we met BBQ when we were there it's not in the report uh and he has this political speech for a while uh saying that he wants to make the revolution and make the revolution by bringing all the gangs together and this is what we see now just to get Ariel HRI out of his office and there were some rumors that it was going to take place when we were there, but they waited for the Prime Minister to leave the country and leave. to Kenya to do what they are doing today, yes, barbecue, Jimmy Sheria, 46-year-old former police officer, he is among all the gang leaders the one who has attracted the most attention, on Tuesday he warned about the Civil War if Ariel Ari, who is now in Puerto Rico unable to return to his own country does not resign L beer explains that we are fighting to overthrow Ariel's government by any means necessary HRI has been trying to overthrow the government for years and could be getting closer to achieving its goal by 46 years old.

Longtime gang leader Jimmy Sherier has become one of Ha's most feared and powerful figures, but the man who rarely appears without his automatic rifle wasn't always on the wrong side of the law during 15 years. Shir worked as an officer with the Haishan National Police. Strength but in 2018 he was fired for his alleged participation in the massacre of civilians and by 2020 he had taken the reins of a powerful criminal alliance nicknamed the G9 family with more than a thousand men under his command nicknamed BBQ for his alleged tendency to burn his opponents alive , which he denies. Shirer has repeatedly claimed that he was not a gangster but a revolutionary fighting against the elite.

We are fighting a system that allows the rich to make millions of dollars while the rest of us, with and for Jimmy Barue, Shier embodies no one. the Corrupt Elite more than Haishan Prime Minister Ariel Henry, in 2022 the G9 Alliance blocked a major fuel terminal in the capital, piling up pressure on the government and in recent days Sheria LED men coordinated attacks against the airport, a police academy and several prisons releasing thousands of inmates. The cop turned gang leader now threatens to plunge the country into Civil War if the Prime Minister doesn't resign, so Floran Deel meets up with Jimmy Sherier, aka BBQ.

Yes, we did. What he wants? Do you want to be the power behind it? the throne or wants the throne, I mean, it's not very clear exactly, but we had, I mean, I had the impression that the gangs were used in the past by politicians, I mean, for their own interest and now you, I want say, no I don't know who is behind him. I mean, is there someone behind him that you don't know, but you see him like he's really sure that he wants, he wants power and I mean he's not afraid to take it on now, so I I mean, we really don't, I want to say, yes, he is confident enough to say that he wants to overthrow the government and he does not say that he wants power for himself.

He doesn't say this, but I mean it is. powerful now Renata saguru what does barbacoa want I mean barbacoa has been for quite some time now presenting himself as a political leader who obviously clashes with the terrible things that the gang he leads and his allies have imposed on the Haian people so there are many reasons to doubt this is true, but in a press conference he gave a couple of nights ago he apologized to the Haitians for what had been done to them and is actually speaking Beyond Haiti to the international community asking that he be seen as an interlocutor, I mean, one could imagine that he might want, as he had requested in the past, to be, for example, a member of the cabinet, something that he has specifically requested in the past.

How much appetite will there be from the international community? For the community to allow something like this, remember that Sheria has been placed on the UN and US sanctions lists, it seems implausible that that is something that, you know, happens, however, what you might be thinking is who wants to position himself in such a way that if the mission arrives and there is a situation where there is a possibility of negotiation with the gangs, then he could obtain some demobilization benefits, for example, keeping much of the money he has been able to raise from extortions. and kidnappings and maybe negotiate a very light prison sentence if a sentence means it's hard to really judge a character like him who used to be part of the police clearly messianic with a pretty high self of himself um but the reality is that no will leave quietly.

I think it's also important to note that Sheria is very important right now because he has been acting in conjunction with other gangs and has relieved this alliance called Vivan Sam which has allowed him and others to really turn the state against the corner as it is. right now, but we must also remember that these alliances are fragile, that these men have their own egos and could start fighting each other again like they were doing. A few weeks ago, the political capital that he has right now seems very high because of these alliances, but we don't know if that's something that's really going to hold, you know, once the situation normalizes a little bit.

To what extent these gangs are really creating a joint group that will be as deceptive as engaging in conversations or even engaging in combat together and how long that will last is something we need to see. So, there it is, on the one hand. uh cool rat talking about the gang alliance, albeit fragile, that's what we're witnessing right now, you heard it before and Tac uh talking about how civil society politicians are trying to come together to find credible leadership uh to take over the country after Ariel HRI What is the feeling? Well, I would like to emphasize that you know it is very important to say it when you know that people like Jimmy sh are talking about a revolution to free the country from corrupt and extremely corrupt politicians.

Business leaders uh, it's rhetoric, uh, because there's no evidence of that underground, their Gang Coalition attacks, you know, normal people, kidnaps, you know, normal citizens and attacks, destroying even small businesses, that's the first thing and the second. I'm hearing in so many international media that you know the opposition to the government is coming from Jimmy Shier or G Philip who was in prison in the US a couple of months ago. I don't believe this narrative is true. um, Prime Minister Ariel was uh, he is a very popular figure, unpopular, sorry, very unpopular in Haiti, he is questioned by the vast majority of Haitians, um, and if people really agree on one thing today, AR is not, you know, an effective leader in Haiti, so what happened in the last few days for someone like you to know to rise up against the government is probably the fact that you know they are deeply opposed to the deployment of a national force in Haiti that would come and you know, it would make it extremely difficult for them to attack the civilian population in Haiti, so how does it feel to be in Haiti now?

I'm not sure I understand the question, right? You mean what's the feeling more in terms of who can join? Is there an alternative to gangs that is emerging well? Frankly, Haitian politicians and civil society leaders have been trying for about four years, even, sorry. the line is being cut with par PR let's try to reconnect with Vidor Miron is there, so there is unanimity, whether it's the gangs or ordinary citizens, people are tired of Ariel H, whose term expired a long time ago, um, there is also a credible alternative there I think there is, I hope there is um, from my point of view, what we can really say is that the state institutions are obviously overwhelmed by the events, that the population is fed up with the situation, so the gangs are now taking up arms and controlling trying to control the country or at least the capital which is not cannot be the solution the fire has to take over it has to be an urgent action it is urgently needed to avoid first uh human what do you like in El Salvador a strong man who comes and puts many people in jail, what I would say is that where there is an alternative, the Civil Society is thinking about building a proposal as an alternative and confronting this situation, some people They call for a quick solution to this multidimensional crisis and suggest, for example, that there is a group and it is really new.

I would say that yesterday, for the first time, there was a revelation. of a proposal that would consist of a three-member national governing council that could take charge of the governance of the country, that this council would be headed perhaps by the two forces that are now trying to oppose those gang controls that I refer to as Commander Army Chief of the army who is really trying to take control. I mean the airport for the moment is under the control of the army, hopefully it will be fine and then in the second, The second member could be the director general of the Haitian National Police, who governs a corpse of 9,000 people who are armed and who can help calm the country and stop, I mean, help take over. fire because otherwise it will lead to a Civil War.

I mean, if the guns are talking, is it already there? because because I'm, I asked the question because, uh, your report mentions that there are civil defense groups in some neighborhoods, yes. exactly in um especially in canap uh it's a neighbor in um in po we met them and of course I mean we interviewed them and they give us the impression that they have no hope, they no longer believe in the government and it's also difficult for them to believe in the police, not because they have a problem with the police, but because they witness the fact that the police cannot, overwhelmed, deal with the gangs, so if the police can't deal with the Gangs they say okay maybe we are part of the solution and we uh want to manage it but the thing is that they are not, I mean that the population also committed like a crime in April because like uh they burned them.

The people were suspected of being gang members, but these people were not tried or anything like that, they were just murdered and burned in the streets, so that's the danger. I mean, it's all about C Tak taking thelaw in their own hands. We mentioned before that Since 2021 and the assassination of President Jovenel Muise, they have been talking about an international police force, Administration B, feeling that Prime Minister Ali has been dragging his feet, just listen to, for example, Karen Jeanpierre herself, person of Sparks from the White House. of Haitian Heritage when asked about the fact that Ariel H is in Puerto Rico right now and cannot return home, so leave it to us, we are not providing any assistance to help the Prime Minister, he will certainly return to Haiti, we are not going to go. to talk about his journey, that's something for him, to talk to what we have asked the Haitian prime minister to do is to advance a political process that will lead to the establishment of a transitional presidential council that will lead to elections. and we believe that it is urgent, that it is urgent that you move in that direction and begin the process of bringing Normally I return to the people of Haiti, okay and, by the way, the Miami Herald has seen a document from the US government that demands that Ariel H resigns, and I quote when the new government structures have been established or this multinational security supports this International. police force is deployed whichever comes first newspaper reports that Biden's team has lost faith in his full ability to lead after repeated direct conversations with the Prime Minister about his unwillingness to sow real Power asked if the administration could imagine a scenario that only remains In Authority, the official said a quote.

It seems unlikely to me, but how much influence does the United States have? Oh, huge amount of clouds. I mean, we really have to understand that Henry has only been in power this long because the United States has been insisting. in their stay there and so with the sign that they might finally lose faith in Henry uh it really changes everything um you know we've been seeing these conversations about creating uh The Joint um The Joint government that we have a Prime Minister and a Council presidential, these talks have been on the table for a long time and there have been multiple processes, some led by kcom and others by private mediators in which they have attempted to get the Caribbean to simply explain to our viewers that the Caribbean regional body does Community of Nations of the Caribbean, so the regional organization that brings together all the governments of the Caribbean had chosen a number of people who had been traveling to Haiti to try to reach an agreement, either due to opposition from the Montana group and others . in the opposition or because of Henry, that hadn't happened now without the United States really putting its weight behind Henry, there's nothing he has to really, keeping him in power like his grip on power was already extremely thin, um and the indication from the US that they are apparently going to leave him stranded in Puerto Rico is apparently just a sign that there is going to have to be a movement probably without him, this could be what finally allows his Haitian counterparts to meet and bring the possibility of a unity government that does not really begin to maintain this fight between Henri and his people and the rest of the civil society parties and that I think would be significantly important, it is very difficult to separate governance from security in the case of the Haitian crisis and without addressing them simultaneously we think that we will not be able to address the enormous humanitarian catastrophe that is occurring in Haiti and that should be, obviously, the only thing we take into account. above all, half of the Haitian people do not have enough food to go, you know, eat every day, there is no access to schools or health services, so this is an indispensable thing that happens, yes, emphasizing that.

The point is that the United Nations, the international community, clearly has doubts when it comes to sending soldiers or police and Haiti needs, as Rado said, to feed its citizens, not just the 360,000 who are displaced, as a reminder, 5, 5 million people, that is, almost half. of Haiti's population needs humanitarian assistance this year. The $674 million humanitarian appeal for Haiti is only 2.5% funded, that means it has received only $17 million, how do you get the world's attention? And yes, I think that with respect to that idea, that proposal that has the support of the population and even the Catholic Church and the Protestant Church are thinking about how to give a mission to that council, eh, that would be, I was talking about the army. , the police, but what is also the third member of that council could be the The most senior judge of the Supreme Court, so if order returns, MH and the gang leaders ask Arieli to leave.

Isn't that going to be bad news for them? Why are they asking you to leave? If that is so. That if what you are suggesting is a return to Law and Order what I am saying is that there would really be the time for dialogue to lay down arms to avoid delving deeper into that crisis and think about how a mission of that kind could be established. council so that there would be a transitional government made up of technicians there that that council could appoint a constituent assembly to draft a new constitution because the Haian Constitution has been contested for decades and that would The council could also establish a provisional electoral council because what the What the population wanted was for these elections to be held and they were not held, so it is very important that these elections be held within a certain time, like 20 20 24 months at most or 18 months. that something be put in place so that those elections can take place and the population of Haishan, knowing the situation they find themselves in, cannot, it is not the revolution that will help them move forward to build their future, so, for Of course, there will be it would be necessary to have Karom's support, since Renata was talking about the international community like the United States and France because, of course, Hati has always been a zone of influence for the United States, the need, the need for The international community needs to work together, although the first step is, of course, to restore law and order to its streets.

I want to thank you very much. I want to thank V for being with us also from po prance rard seura and Floran de you. We have a longer article coming out next week on an investigative news program. Thank you, thank you for being us, thank you for joining us here in the France 24 debate.