Security forces in Haiti have shot dead four suspected killers of President Jovenel Moise and captured two others, the country’s police chief said, as the brazen assassination threatened to plunge the already impoverished, crisis-hit Caribbean nation deeper into chaos.
Police General Director Leon Charles described the four people killed as “mercenaries” and said that security forces were locked in a fierce gun battle with the men who assassinated the president at his home overnight, Al Jazeera reported.
Helen La Lime, who also heads the UN Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH) said the prime minister, who now leads the government in line with the country’s constitution in the event of a sitting president’s death, was committed “to dialogue, and to continuing with a process to hold elections according to the electoral calendar that was released just last week.”
Moise, a 53-year-old former businessman who took office in 2017, was shot dead and his wife, Martine Moise, was seriously wounded when heavily armed assassins stormed the couple’s home in the hills above Port-au-Prince at around 1am local time on Wednesday (05:00 GMT).
