Haiti: Some 20 people have been killed in the Ti Bwa and Grand'ravine districts

central america / caribbean | repression / prisoners | non-anarchist press Friday July 14, 2006 21:58 by Friend of Haiti - AHP sub at sonic dot net

from attacks launched by the "Ti manchèt" Army

Some 20 people were killed and several others injured by gunfire and stabbing over the past 72 hours during attacks launched by armed men belonging to the so-called "Ti Manchèt Army" (Small Machete Army) in the populist districts of Grand'Ravine and Ti Bwa in southern Port-au-Prince.

Port-au-Prince, July 7, 2006 (AHP); Some 20 people were killed and several others injured by gunfire and stabbing over the past 72 hours during attacks launched by armed men belonging to the so-called "Ti Manchèt Army" (Small Machete Army) in the populist districts of Grand'Ravine and Ti Bwa in southern Port-au-Prince.

Several homes were also set on fire.

According to residents who were fleeing the region this Friday, the men of the Ti Manchèt Army began their killing spree after they accused residents of Grand'Ravine of having killed a member of their band.

This is the very same Ti Manchèt Army formed under the interim regime of Gérard Latortue that carried out a massacre of more than 10 people who were attending a soccer game sponsored by USAID in August 2005 in the populist quarter of Grand' Ravine.

These individuals, who operated in several populist neighborhoods side by side with officers of the Haitian National Police, had accused the victims of the massacre at that time of being supporters of the President-in-Exile, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

The Director General of the Haitian National Police, Mario Andrésol, confirmed the deaths of more than 10 people in these districts in this latest violence.

Mr. Andrésol commented that teams have been sent to the scene to control the situation and to try to offer a solution. Shortly after he took over the job of director of the national police, Mr. Andrésol ordered an investigation to identify and arrest the authors as well as those who were behind the massacre of August 2005.

However most of the individuals arrested and charged with the massacre, including police officers, were set free by the interim government authorities.

The Deputy representing the third District of Port-au-Prince, Jean Clédor Miryl, for his part denounced this latest situation of violence developing in the districts of Grand'Ravine and Ti Bwa

Mr. Miryl is asking that the appropriate authorities intervene rapidly to prevent the situation from worsening.