Rights teams and United Nations accuse head of highly effective Haitian G9 gang alliance of lethal assaults on civilians.
The UN Safety Council has voted unanimously to impose sanctions on Haitian gang chief Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, because the worldwide neighborhood pushes to deliver an finish to surging violence within the crisis-hit Caribbean nation.
The decision on Friday established a mechanism to punish people and teams that “threaten the peace, safety or stability of Haiti” – and Cherizier was the primary individual to be sanctioned below the scheme.
The chief of the so-called “G9 Household and Allies” gang alliance has change into one of many faces of the multi-layered points plaguing the nation, which is affected by political turmoil, a cholera outbreak and power insecurity.
Right here, Al Jazeera appears to be like at Cherizier’s background, alleged abuses and professed objectives:
Ex-police officer
A former officer of the Haitian Nationwide Police (HNP), Cherizier has been linked to varied human rights violations and deadly assaults in opposition to civilians, in accordance with a number of studies by media shops, worldwide observers and rights teams.
The United Nations additionally has blamed the highly effective confederation of gangs that he leads for one in every of Haiti’s most urgent and recurring issues during the last months: extreme gasoline shortages.
The gang alliance is blocking a serious gasoline terminal within the capital, Port-au-Prince, which has compelled hospitals to chop again on companies and pushed the nation in the direction of a serious humanitarian catastrophe.
Final 12 months, Cherizier stated the tactic of blocking gasoline terminals aimed to pressure Haiti’s performing prime minister, Ariel Henry, to resign from workplace.
“If Ariel Henry resigns at 8:00, then at 8:05, we take away all of the barricades, so the vehicles can come to the gasoline depot and refill, after which the disaster will cease,” Cherizier informed Al Jazeera in an interview that aired in October 2021.
Henry got here to energy after the assassination of President Jovenel Moise in July of final 12 months. Whereas he enjoys Western help, Haitian civil rights teams have questioned his legitimacy, particularly after Henry indefinitely postponed presidential and legislative elections final 12 months.
Cherizier has introduced himself as a revolutionary, combating a system of inequality and the elites who management it. “We're combating for one more society – one other Haiti that's not just for the 5 % of the individuals who preserve all of the wealth, however a brand new Haiti the place everybody can have meals and clear water, to allow them to have a good home to dwell, one other Haiti the place we don’t have to go away the nation,” he stated in the identical interview final 12 months.
‘Coordinated, brutal assaults’
However the gang chief is accused of a number of abuses in opposition to Haitians, relationship again to his days with the safety forces.
The UN and the US have stated Cherizier was an HNP officer when he was concerned in a 2018 bloodbath within the Port-au-Prince neighbourhood of La Saline that killed dozens of individuals.
The assault was coordinated between Haitian officers and native gangs to “repress political dissent” within the capital, the US Division of the Treasury stated in a 2020 assertion saying sanctions in opposition to Cherizier.
“Throughout this assault, not less than 71 individuals had been killed, over 400 homes had been destroyed, and not less than seven ladies had been raped by armed gangs,” a US authorities report stated in 2021. “All through 2018 and 2019, Cherizier led armed teams in coordinated, brutal assaults in Port-au-Prince neighborhoods.”
In line with native information studies, Cherizier was fired from the police late in 2018, and months later, an arrest warrant was issued in opposition to him on accusations he participated within the execution of civilians throughout a police raid within the Grand Ravine space of Port-au-Prince in 2017.
Cherizier has denied the accusations. “I’m not a gangster. I by no means shall be a gangster,” he informed Al Jazeera final 12 months. “It’s the system I’m combating in opposition to in the present day. The system has some huge cash; they personal the media. Now they attempt to make me seem like a gangster.”
Demand of amnesty
Amid the present turmoil, The Related Press reported this month that Cherizier had “proposed his personal plan for Haiti’s future — even looking for seats within the Cupboard — whereas demanding that the [Henry] administration … grant amnesty and void arrest warrants in opposition to the group’s members”.
In an interview with the information company in 2019, the gang chief stated he was born near La Saline because the youngest of eight kids, and his father died when he was 5.
Cherizier additionally informed The AP at the moment concerning the origins of his alias, “Barbecue”, denying that it was about burning individuals. He stated he acquired the identify as a baby when his mom was a fried hen avenue vendor.
Throughout the previous 12 months, Cherizier has spoken usually to reporters. Throughout his dialog with Al Jazeera, he walked by means of the desolate streets of La Saline and had pleasant interactions with residents. He usually has a big rifle strapped round his physique throughout public appearances.
However the picture that Cherizier has tried to venture as a frontrunner on the facet of the poor stands in stark distinction with a number of the accusations levelled in opposition to him and the gangs he leads.
Haiti’s Nationwide Community for the Protection of Human Rights launched a report (PDF) in August documenting “mass and repeated rape perpetrated in opposition to ladies and women” throughout violence between Cherizier’s followers and rival gangs in Cite Soleil, an impoverished space of Port-au-Prince.
An earlier report by the group final 12 months additionally accused Cherizier of ordering killings and the burning of houses in varied assaults within the nation.
That was echoed by Friday’s UN Safety Council decision, which said that “all through 2018 and 2019, Cherizier led armed teams in coordinated, brutal assaults in Port-au-Prince neighbourhoods.
“In Might 2020, Cherizier led armed gangs in a five-day assault in a number of Port-au-Prince neighborhoods by which civilians had been killed and homes had been set on fireplace,” the decision stated.
It added that his actions, together with the blocking of the gasoline terminal, “have straight contributed to the financial paralysis and humanitarian disaster in Haiti“. The UN sanctions in opposition to Cherizier embrace an property freeze and a worldwide journey ban.
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