Two reporters and a police officer are killed in a gang attack on a Haitian hospital that is reopening.
According to Haiti’s online media association, a gang attack on the reopening of the largest public hospital in Port-au-Prince on Tuesday resulted in the deaths of two reporters and the injuries of numerous others. The attack also claimed the life of a police officer.
Authorities had promised to reopen the General Hospital in Haiti’s capital on Christmas Eve after street gangs forced its closure early this year. However, suspected gang members opened fire on reporters who had gathered to cover the event.
It was the latest in a string of coordinated gang attacks on police stations, prisons, and the main international airport in Haiti, which has been left crippled by an unprecedented crisis.
Robest Dimanche, a spokesman for the Online Media Collective, identified the killed journalists as Markenzy Nathoux and Jimmy Jean. Dimanche said an unspecified number of reporters were also been in the attack, which he blamed on the Viv Ansanm coalition of gangs.
The Haitian Association of Journalists confirmed two reporters and a police officer were killed, and seven reporters were wounded in what it called “a macabre scene comparable to terrorism, pure and simple.”
Haiti’s interim president, Leslie Voltaire, said in an address to the nation that journalists and police were among the victims of the attack. He did not specify the casualty numbers or provide a breakdown.
“I send my sympathies to the people who were victims, the national police and the journalists,” Voltaire said.
Later, the government put out a statement saying it is “responding firmly to the attack.”
“This heinous act, which targets an institution dedicated to health and life, constitutes an unacceptable attack on the very foundations of our society,” said the statement.
Earlier, a video that the reporters who were confined to the hospital uploaded online purportedly showed two men’s lifeless bodies on stretchers with bloodied clothing. One of the men wore a press credential around his neck on a lanyard.
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