PORT-AU-PRINCE (AP) — A leader of one of Haiti’s most powerful gangs was injured in a shootout with Haitian and Kenyan police in their first major incursion into gang-controlled territory since a U.N.-backed mission began earlier this year, police said.
The second-in-command of the Kraze Baryè gang, known simply as “Deshommes,” was shot in Torcelle, a community the gang controls in the southeast region of the capital Port-au-Prince, Haiti National Police said in a statement Tuesday.
Some 20 other gang members were killed during the police operations, which occurred on Saturday and Monday, officials said, adding that they confiscated firearms, munitions, phones and “sensitive materials and equipment.” Nobody was detained in the operations, and police didn’t say how they know that Deshommes was injured.
Police said the incursions would continue until the gang and its top leader, Vitel’Homme Innocent, could be neutralized.
In a statement, the Kenyans who are leading the mission called on Innocent to “stop committing atrocities against innocent Haitians.”
“(The mission) is sending a strong warning to key gang leaders to stop the barbarous acts of rapes, extortion, kidnapping, blackmail and killings,” they said.
Innocent has been sanctioned by the U.S., the European Union and the U.N. Security Council, with the U.S. offering a $2 million reward for information leading to his capture. He has been indicted in the U.S. for the armed kidnapping of 16 Christian missionaries in 2021 and the slaying of missionary Marie Franklin and kidnapping of her husband in 2022.
In a recent video, Innocent stands near an armored vehicle set on fire that police said they were forced to abandon due to engine failure during one of their operations.
Innocent claimed the gang was not giving police any problems and accused them of “hurting too many innocent people.” He also said the gang has the power to decide who enters and leaves the community it controls.
Kraze Baryè is an ally of the G-Pèp gang federation, an enemy of G9 Family and Allies, another federation led by former elite police officer Jimmy Chérizier, best known as Barbecue.
Kraze Baryè has about 600 members and controls the community of Tabarre as well as parts of Pétionville and Croix-des-Bouquets. The gang is accused of killings, drug and weapon trafficking, rapes, robberies and other crimes, according to the U.N., which called it “one of the most powerful gangs” in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area.
Kenyan officials pledged that “the pressure will be sustained on the gangs until or unless they surrender to the authorities.”
They also noted that operations are still ongoing in the central town of Pont-Sondé, where at least 115 people were killed by another gang earlier this month.
Prime Minister Garry Conille, who visited Kenya and the United Arab Emirates this month to secure more resources for the police mission, told reporters that the police and army are better equipped now than earlier this year, when gangs launched coordinated attacks targeting key government infrastructure.
“Pretty soon we will see more action,” Conille said, promising that special forces would free more roads and communities from the gangs’ stranglehold.
By EVENS SANON/Associated Press