Haiti - FLASH : The PNH arrests 4 alleged Gang Leaders
Last Weekend (4-5 May), during anti-gang operations, the National Police of Haiti (PNH) arrested four alleged gang leaders of in the region of Jérémie (Grand'Anse Dept.) The following were arrested: Jacquelin Bernard (23 years old), an alleged gang leader from La Saline, Montoute Hilaire and Marcelin Dady, two alleged gang leaders of Cité Militaire and Dieumaître Benjami a Gang leader from Jérémie who had allowed the other 3 Chiefs of gang arrested, to take refuge in the area, according to police sources.
If the arrest of 4 Gang leaders is a step in the right direction, no one knows how many Gangs are active in Haiti. Rebel Dorcénat, a member of the National Commission for Disarmament Demobilization and Reinsertion (CNDDR), said Monday on the radio of the capital "We have so far indexed 76 Gangs across the country and we have not finished yet [...]" adding that the numbers of these armed gangs vary between 10 and 350 men...
If the Commission, which is still waiting for a budget, claims to have already had exchanges with more than 70% of the leaders of Gangs identified, Rebel Dorcénat stresses that if they say they are open to lay down their weapons, they are very demanding and ask their conditions, the impunity for them and their henchmen. What the Commission, which is not justice, can not promise them underlines Rebel Dorcénat, which is no illusion, aware that it is not the Commission that will solve the problem of the proliferation of weapons in Haiti, believing that the solution to this problem will take time...
