HAITI: BETWEEN FIVE AND TEN HAITIANS KILLED IN CITE SOLEIL AFTER POLICE AND U.N. PEACEKEEPERS MOVE INTO AREA IN ATTEMPT TO ROUND UP ARMED GANG MEMMERS

Record ID: 378908

  • Title: HAITI: BETWEEN FIVE AND TEN HAITIANS KILLED IN CITE SOLEIL AFTER POLICE AND U.N. PEACEKEEPERS MOVE INTO AREA IN ATTEMPT TO ROUND UP ARMED GANG MEMMERS
  • Date: 15th April 2005
  • Summary: (W1) CITE SOLEIL, HAITI (APRIL 15, 2005) (REUTERS) 1. GV: PEOPLE RUNNING IN DISTANCE, SOUND OF GUNSHOTS 0.05 2. LV: PEOPLE RUNNING, SOUND OF GUNSHOTS 0.08 3. LV: PEOPLE RUN PAST BURNING BARRICADE, SOUND OF GUNSHOTS 0.11 4. BOY CRIES OVER BODY OF DEAD BROTHER 0.17 5. PEOPLE CARRY BODY OF DEAD MAN; BOY SCREAMS 0.23 6.
  • Embargoed: 30th April 2005 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: CITE SOLEIL, HAITI
  • Country: Haiti
  • Reuters ID: LVA2SY828IN2OC6U0CEJ7HDL02TJ
  • Story Text: A "medal parade" honoring U.N. peacekeepers from the
    Philippines became a ceremony of mourning on Friday, a day
    after one of them was shot dead in a tense slum of Haiti's
    capital Port-au-Prince.



    Between five and ten Haitians were killed on Friday
    (April 15) in the seaside slum of Cite Soleil, located next
    to the capital, when UN peacekeepers and Haitian police
    moved into the area in an attempt to round up armed gang
    members and bring stability to the strife-torn
    neighbourhood which is controlled by a gang which says it
    will fight to death in its attempt to bring back President
    Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was ousted last year.

    The UN said those killed where armed gang members who
    shot at UN peacekeepers.

    On Thursday (April 14), 39-year-old Technical Sergeant
    Antonio Batomalaque from the Philippine town of Davao was
    shot in the head and killed as he and a group of soldiers
    were setting up a barricade-checkpoint.

    Batomalaque was the fifth peacekeeper to die in Haiti
    and the third killed in action since the mission began.

    Angry people blamed the deaths on the interim government.

    "We were minding our own business and the foreigners
    came and just starting shooting at us," said a man who gave
    his name as "Claude." "We didn't do anything. Here in Cite
    Soleil, we live in peace. The UN soldiers are always
    bugging us."
    But the slum has been the site of constant gang battles
    which have killed scores and left hundreds of ramshackle
    shacks burned.

    Peruvian peacekeepers in the area said that they are
    trying to bring peace and also to recuperate stolen
    vehicles that end up there. A Peruvian soldier showed
    journalists the bullet holes in his tank.

    "We were rounding up stolen cars... stolen cars, and
    that's what happened," he said.

    The clash between peacekeepers and armed Cite Soleil
    residents came one day after the UN soldier was killed and
    on the penultimate day of a high-level visit of ten members
    of the UN Security Council to Haiti. The Council members
    are here to evaluate the mission and its effectiveness as
    the country attempts to move towards elections slated for
    next fall.

    On Friday (April 15), UN General Augusto Heleno and the
    Philippines Permanent Representative to the UN Security
    Council Lauro L. Baja Jr. officiated at a ceremony where
    they awarded medals to some members of the fallen soldier's
    battalion.

    "Well, any death, whatever the cause, whatever time,
    whatever the place, is a tragic event, and it so happened
    that when the Security Council is meeting with a
    Philippines member, it should happen now," Baja said.

    Heleno said that the UN soldiers in Cite Soleil are not
    necessarily going after the pro-Aristide gang leader there.

    They are just trying to accomplish the UN mandate. "We have
    not the objective of one person," he said. "Our objective
    is to normalize the life in Cite Soleil and to give the
    population the opportunity to have peace and to work and to
    go to school and to open their markets, the hospital,
    that's our objective."
    But in the nearby slum of Bel-Aire, once again hundreds
    took to the narrow and dirty streets to demonstrate and
    call for Aristide's return and for the resignation of the
    interim government.

    Human rights groups say more than 650 people have been
    killed since September.
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