Scores slain in weekend attacks in Haiti's Cité Soleil, observers say

Scores of people were killed over the weekend in Haiti's Cité Soleil area, Haiti's prime minister's office said on Monday, after attacks that the state and two non-governmental groups allege were ordered by a gang leader.

"A red line has been crossed," the prime minister's office said in a statement posted on X, adding it would "mobilize all forces to track down and annihilate" those responsible, including gang leader Monel "Mikano" Felix, whom it accused of planning the attack.

The statement from the prime minister's office said the number of dead was roughly 180, a total that was significantly higher than what several observer groups were citing in the wake of the reported violence.

The National Human Rights Defense Network (RNDDH), an NGO in Haiti that monitors state institutions and promotes human rights education, said on Sunday at least 110 people — all aged over 60 — had been killed in Cité Soleil over the weekend.

It later said the death toll could be higher and cited witnesses as saying that "mutilated bodies were burned in the streets, including several young individuals who were killed attempting to save residents."

The Cooperative for Peace and Development, a local rights group, meanwhile, said in a statement Sunday that its monitoring unit found that around 20 older people were killed. But it noted that unidentified residents in the community claimed there were more than 100 victims.

Murky information

The murky information was a worrying sign in a country in the grip of widespread gang violence.

"The fact that we have so many doubts about what happened days after the massacre is a signal that clearly indicates the level of control (gangs) have on the population," said Diego Da Rin, an analyst with the International Crisis Group.

RNDDH said Felix, the gang leader, had ordered the violence after his child became sick, and after seeking advice from a Vodou priest who accused elderly people in the area of harming the child through witchcraft. The group said Felix's child had died on Saturday afternoon.

Reuters was not able to independently verify the events outlined by RNDDH. Felix did not comment on the accusations.

The Cooperative for Peace and Development said information circulating in the community suggests that Felix accused people in the neighbourhood for causing his son's illness.

"He decided to cruelly punish all elderly people and (Vodou) practitioners who, in his imagination, would be capable of casting a bad spell on his son," the group said in a statement cited in reporting by The Associated Press.

The group said gunmen rounded up well-known community leaders and took them to the gang leader's stronghold, where they were executed. Also killed were motorcycle drivers who tried to save some victims.

It also noted that there's a ban on people leaving the community "in order to continue to identify (Vodou) practitioners and the elderly with the aim of carrying out the silent killing."

Da Rin, of the International Crisis Group, noted that usually killings in Haiti are documented and posted on social media, though they can be difficult to verify. "In this case, there was not even a message on WhatsApp or a video on TikTok, which is very unusual," he said.

The Cooperative for Peace and Development said Felix has previously targeted Vodou practitioners, killing a dozen older women and Vodou leaders "wrongly accused of witchcraft" in recent years.

It's not unusual for Haitians to seek medical and other advice from Vodou priests.

Cité Soleil, a densely populated area near the port of the capital Port-au-Prince, is among the poorest and most violent areas of Haiti.

Tight gang control, including the restriction of mobile phone use, has limited residents' ability to share information about the massacre.

The government, riven with political infighting, has struggled to contain gangs' growing power in and around the capital. The armed groups are accused of indiscriminate killings, gang rapes, ransom kidnappings and fuelling critical food shortages.

In October, the Gran Grif gang took responsibility for the killing of at least 115 people in Pont-Sondé, a town in Haiti's breadbasket Artibonite region. They said it was retaliation for residents helping a self-defence group hinder their road toll operations.

Calls for peacekeepers

A UN-backed security mission was requested by Haiti in 2022 and approved a year later but so far has just partially deployed and remains deeply under-resourced.

Haitian leaders have called for the Kenyan-led Multinational Security Support mission to be converted into a UN peacekeeping force to ensure it is better supplied, but the plan stalled amid opposition from China and Russia in the Security Council.

"The Secretary-General reiterates his pressing call to Member States to provide the Multinational Security Support mission the financial and logistical support required to successfully assist the Haitian National Police," said Stéphane Dujarric, the spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General, in a statement.

A White House security spokesperson echoed the call for urgent international support for the mission and said the United States was "appalled."

"The crisis in Haiti has reached catastrophic levels with allied criminal groups intensifying large-scale, coordinated attacks on the population and key state infrastructure," Human Rights Watch said Monday as it called for a UN mission.

Dujarric also called for an acceleration of the political transition within Haiti. Haiti's transitional government has said it plans to hold long-awaited elections in 2025, provided there is sufficient security for a free and fair vote.

The security situation has, however, continued to deteriorate, and many countries have yet to deliver on pledges of support.

Volker Turk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged countries to improve efforts to stop arms trafficking to Haiti. The UN estimates the gangs' increasingly modern arsenals are largely trafficked from the United States.

"These latest killings bring the death toll just this year in Haiti to a staggering 5,000 people," he said.