2024-03-05 15:45:00
(CNN) — While in Port-au-Prince, the Haitian capital, waiting for the opportunity to interview the most notorious gang leader, Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, Giles Clarke heard semi-automatic gunshots from what seemed like only two or three blocks away.
“I looked at the group of locals, wondering if they could respond, but they barely moved a muscle,” the photojournalist recalled. “It was just another day in Delmas 6 (neighborhood), and the constant flurry of bullets flying over the nearby building didn’t seem unusual at all.”
Every few minutes there was another burst, followed by return fire.
This is life now in Port-au-Prince, where gangs control 80% of the city, the UN estimates, and continue fighting for the rest.
Hundreds of Haitians who fled gang violence live in tents outside a displacement center in Port-au-Prince. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
A gang member affiliated with Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier’s G9 alliance holds a rifle in Port-au-Prince. Gangs control 80% of the capital, the UN estimates. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Haitian police inspect documents at a checkpoint on a street leading from the city center to the port. It is one of the few places controlled by the police, said photojournalist Giles Clarke. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Haiti has been in a state of turmoil for years, but multiple security sources in the capital told CNN that the most recent surge in gang violence, which has targeted police stations, the international airport and the national penitentiary, It is unprecedented.
Haiti’s government declared a state of emergency on Sunday, citing “deteriorating security” and “increasingly violent criminal acts perpetrated by armed gangs,” including kidnappings and murders of citizens, violence against women and children, and looting.
Armed groups attacked the country’s two largest prisons on Saturday, and a United Nations source said around 3,500 prisoners are believed to have escaped from the National Penitentiary in Port-au-Prince over the weekend.
Pheguens, a 29-year-old school bus driver, was shot in the back last month. Clarke saw many injured civilians while he was in Haiti. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
A broken glass inside one of the police department’s armored anti-gang vehicles. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Meanwhile, more than 300,000 Haitian civilians have been forced to flee their homes due to gang violence, according to the United Nations.
“All the travel sites I went to in September have probably doubled their capacity now,” said Clarke, a New York-based photojournalist who has been visiting the Caribbean country on and off since 2011.
Clarke returned last month to document the unrest in Port-au-Prince. He witnessed more harrowing scenes, including a hospital where he saw countless people suffering from gunshot wounds.
“Many of them were civilians affected by gang crossfire and most near the markets. “These are people just going about their daily lives,” Clarke said. “The doctors were overwhelmed. “There was a lack of supplies.”
A funeral procession at the Grand Cemetery in downtown Port-au-Prince. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Morgues were also overcrowded in the city.
“You could smell it on the street,” Clarke said. “I remember asking (my guide) Joe, ‘What is that?’ And he said, ‘Dead people.'”
Clarke said many of them were victims of gang violence whose bodies had not been claimed by families.
“If you don’t claim them or if no one pays, these bodies will just rot,” he said. “There is very little cooling.”
A coffin lies in a downtown morgue. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Cherizier, in the center, walks through the streets of the capital. Lead an alliance of gangs in the city. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
While in Haiti, Clarke also managed to come face to face with Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, a former police officer who leads a gang alliance in Port-au-Prince.
Cherizier has made it clear that his goal is to overthrow the government of Prime Minister Ariel Henry.
He told Clarke that the gangs want to change the current system and create a new Haiti. While Cherizier’s men wore balaclavas to protect their identities, he did not have one.
“He is often the only one not wearing a mask – a defiant face of the Haitian resistance,” Clarke said.
An armed gang member in the Delmas 3 neighborhood. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Gherisse, 42, is recovering at General Hospital two days after being caught in gang crossfire and shot in the neck. She worked as a food vendor downtown. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Violet, 63, lies on the floor of General Hospital after being shot twice in the arm. She says her 34-year-old daughter was killed when two warring gangs rampaged through her neighborhood just an hour earlier. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Henry, who assumed leadership of the country after the assassination of President Jovenel Moise in 2021, was supposed to hold elections and transfer power by February 7. But last month he said he could not resign because conditions in the country were not safe enough to organize an election.
“My interim government is working hand in hand with the police to restore normal life in the country,” he said in an address to the nation. “We are aware that many things have to change, but we must make those changes together and calmly.”
That is not acceptable to Cherizier, who on Friday reiterated his demand that Henry be arrested.
“We ask the Haitian National Police and the Army to assume their responsibility and arrest Ariel Henry,” he said. “Once again, the population is not our enemy; armed groups are not the enemy. Arrest Ariel Henry for the liberation of the country. … With these weapons, we will liberate the country, and these weapons will change the country.”
Cherizier and her dog Barbie. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
A girl stands in the stands of a former school sports stadium that is now a center for displaced people. She is one of more than 600 children now living in the overcrowded shelter, Clarke said. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Cherizier has faced sanctions from both the UN and the US Treasury Department. The UN has accused Cherizier of human rights abuses, including orchestrating deadly attacks against civilians over the years, saying his actions “have directly contributed to the economic paralysis and humanitarian crisis in Haiti.”
Clarke visited him in late February at his modest hilltop home at 6 Delmas.
“We actually did the interview in the abandoned building across the street from him,” Clarke said. “It is said that he did not want many people to live so close to him.”
After a brief interview in which Cherizier laid out his vision for Haiti, Clarke walked with him through the streets. Clarke remembers how calm he was when he was with Cherizier. “There were no shots fired because (the men) were all with Jimmy,” he said.
A view from inside a Haitian police armored vehicle. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
A man stands on the back of a truck as it crosses into the Delmas 6 neighborhood. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
To try to restore order to his country, Henry has asked for military help. The deployment of a Kenyan-led multinational security force was given the green light by the UN Security Council last year and Henry recently visited Kenya to finalize details, but it is unclear when those troops might arrive.
The United States agreed to provide $200 million to the mission, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the situation in Haiti “one of the most urgent challenges we face as an international community.”
Jean Junior Joseph, a senior adviser to Prime Minister Henry, told CNN that the Government has limited options at this time.
“The gangs have more ammunition than us,” he said.
A man and woman, displaced by gang violence, now live in a former school building in the Delmas 4 neighborhood. (Credit: Giles Clarke)
Credits
Photographer: Giles Clarke
Escritor: Kyle Almond
Photo Editors: Bernadette Tuazon, Brett Roegiers and Will Lanzoni
Contributing reporters: David Culver, Jeremy Dupin, Caitlin Stephen Hu, Stefano Pozzebon, Manveena Suri and Michelle Velez
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