By NAN Staff Writer
News Americas, FORT LAUDERDALE, FL, Thurs. July 8, 2021: With so much news on Haiti following the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse on July 7, 2021, here are 10 of the latest fast facts you should know this morning:
1: President Jovenel Moïse was reportedly found dead on the floor of his bedroom. The deputy justice of the peace of Pétion-Ville, Carl Henry Destin, told the Nouvelliste newspaper that his body was riddled with at least 12 bullets.
He was found dead, lying on his back, blue pants, a white shirt stained with blood, his mouth open, his left eye gouged out, the paper quoted Destin as saying. He also told the paper that Moïse was shot to the forehead, in each nipple, at the hip and in the abdomen by large caliber weapons and with 9 mm projectiles. The president’s office and bedroom were also reportedly ransacked.
2: The maid and the boy on duty were tied up by members of the commando team who shouted “DEA operation” as they entered the property, the judge said. No other person at the presidential residence was shot except for the first lady who is now in a Miami hospital. The Moïse’s daughter, Jomarlie Jovenel Moïse, present at the time of the attack, hid in her brother’s bedroom. A video purporting to show attackers prior to the murder has been released HERE
3: The Director General of the Haitian National Police, Léon Charles, has announced the death of four alleged attackers involved in the assassination of President Moïse and the arrest of two. “Following the instructions, we had received, we chased the mercenaries,” he was quoted as saying on television in Haiti. “We prevented them from leaving the crime scene,” he added. “Some have taken refuge in Pèlerin and we have started the fight with them. 4 of them were killed, 2 were intercepted and are under our control. The 3 policemen they had taken hostage have been released and they are safe.”
4: There is already confusion in the ranks. Dr. Ariel Henry, the Prime Minister appointed on July 5th by Moise, is claiming his right to direct the interim Prime Minister, Claude Joseph, who has taken the reins. “I am an appointed Prime Minister Claude was an interim Prime Minister who resumed his positions as Minister of Foreign Affairs. I think we need to talk to each other. Claude was supposed to stay in the government I was going to have,” he was quoted by Le Nouvelliste newspaper as saying.
He also told Le Nouvelliste that he does not share certain decisions taken by Joseph in the recent hours since the murder of Moïse, especially as it relates to the decreed state of siege. “I don’t think we’re in a situation that requires a state of siege. I think it’s a bit rushed. This is my point of view,” he was quoted by the paper as saying. “A government that has resigned is a government that has resigned to my knowledge. It is not a full-fledged government. If there was no need to have another government, I think that President Jovenel Moïse would not have sought me out or made the consultations.”
5: The members of the UN Security Council condemned in the strongest terms the assassination of the President who was ruling by decree, and expressed their condolences to his family and to the Haitian people while calling for the perpetrators to be swiftly brought to justice. They also made an emphatic call on all political stakeholders in Haiti to refrain from any acts of violence and any incitement to violence.
6: Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community, CARICOM, strongly condemned what they termed an “abhorrent and reprehensible act,” that comes at a time of deep turmoil and institutional weakness in the country. They called for the perpetrators to be apprehended and brought to justice, and for law and order to prevail. CARICOM also expressed its willingness to play a lead role in facilitating a process of national dialogue and negotiation to help the Haitian people and their institutions to craft an indigenous solution to the crisis. They called on the people of Haiti to remain calm, and to overcome their differences and unite at this moment of national peril. As a mark of respect, the Member States of the Community and the CARICOM Secretariat will fly their national flags and the CARICOM Standard at half-mast for three days beginning immediately, as well as on the day of the funeral of the President.
7: Moise and his wife, Martine Moise, who is now critically injured in at the Ryder Trauma Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, had three children together: Jomarlie, Joverlein and Jovenel Jr. All three children are adults. Martine Marie Etienne and Jovenel Moise were classmates and childhood sweethearts, according to The Focus. They were married in 1996. Jomarlie Moise, who went by ‘JoJo,’ was the couple’s only daughter. According to La Nouvelliste newspaper, she survived uninjured by hiding in one of her brother’s room.
8: While condemning the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moise on Wednesday, the US insisted the country should still proceed with elections in September. “It is still the view of the United States that elections this year should proceed,” Ned Price, the US State Department spokesperson said at a briefing Wednesday afternoon. “We know that free and fair elections are the democratic path towards ending Haiti’s irregular and prolonged rule by decree and restoring its parliament, which as of now has lapsed. Free and fair presidential elections will facilitate a peaceful transfer of power to a newly elected president as well.”
The United States also called on all political parties, civil society groups, and stakeholders to – like Acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph – call for calm and to work together in the wake of this tragedy to ensure peace and democratic governance.
“What we know and what we will continue to do is to preserve Haiti’s democratic institutions,” the State Department spokesman said. “We know that by preserving Haiti’s democratic institutions, that is key to restoring peace.”
And the US shot down a report that its DEA had anything to do with the assassination and urged Haitian authorities to bring those responsible to justice.
“Well, as you said, the Haitian ambassador himself has dismissed these allegations,” Price stated. “These reports are absolutely false. The United States condemns this heinous act. These false reports are nothing more than that, just false reports.”
9: President Moise is only the second Caribbean leader to be murdered while in office in recent years and the first President. The first was Prime Minister Maurice Bishop of Grenada in 1983. A four-man People’s Revolutionary Army firing squad executed Bishop, three members of his Cabinet and four others by machine-gunning them. After he was dead, a gunman slit his throat and cut off his finger to steal his ring. The bodies were then transported to a military camp and partially burned in a pit. The location of their remains is still unknown.
10: World leaders, including many from across the Caribbean and Latin America are weighing in. Latin American leaders are among those around the world expressing shock and disbelief at the brazen assassination of the President of Haiti in his private residence. The president of the Dominican Republic, Luis Abinader, said he was closing the four border crossings that his country shares with Haiti on the island of Hispaniola. He has also stepped up the military presence by the frontier, Noticias Sin reported.
