Thousands of prisoners have been released from several prisons in Haiti as tension continued to escalate days after Kenya signed a treaty agreeing to deploy 1,000 police officers to the country.
In a post on X, one of Haiti’s Police Unions pleaded for all officers in the capital with access to cars and weapons to assist police battling to maintain control of the penitentiary and warned that if the attackers were successful “we are done. No one will be spared in the capital because there will be 3,000 extra bandits now effective,” according to the statement.
Multiple security sources in Port-au-Prince told CNN that the most recent surge in violence, which began Thursday and has targeted police stations, the international airport and the National Penitentiary, is unprecedented in recent years.
On Friday, Haitian gang leader Jimmy Cherizier, also known as Barbecue, said he would continue in his effort to try and oust Prime Minister Ariel Henry.
“We ask the Haitian National Police and the military to take responsibility and arrest Ariel Henry. Once again, the population is not our enemy; the armed groups are not your enemy. You arrest Ariel Henry for the country’s liberation,” Cherizier said, adding “With these weapons, we will liberate the country, and these weapons will change the country.”
Cherizier is a former police officer who heads an alliance of gangs. He has faced sanctions from both the United Nations and the United States Department of Treasury.
Public frustration, which had been building against Henry over his inability to curb the unrest, boiled over after he failed to step down last month, citing the escalating violence.
With the escalating violence, 1000 police officers from Kenya are expected to be flown in Haiti for a peace keeping mission.
It is not clear when is their departure date, but the deployment has received some resistance from a section of some political leaders.
