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The investigation of the murder of Moïse, a novel full of unknowns and Latin American connections

2021-07-23T17:07:22.308Z


Among those detained are Colombian mercenaries, Haitian police and members of the Haitian diaspora in Miami. A Venezuelan businessman and an Ecuadorian are also among the suspects.


Jovenel Moïse's widow, Martine, says goodbye to her husband during the funeral held this Friday in Cap-Haitien, in northern Haiti.Matias Delacroix / AP

Haiti said goodbye to its president, Jovenel Moïse, this Friday in a ceremony in Cap-Haitien, in the north of the country, 15 days after he was tortured and murdered at his home in Port-au-Prince.

The investigation of his death, for which there are at least 26 detainees - including 18 Colombians, ex-military men who were supposedly hired for the assassination -, at least ten fugitives and suspects from various countries, has overtones of a novel of intrigue and is full of unknowns and connections with different countries in Latin America.

Assassination in Haiti

  • Jovenel Moïse, a president surrounded by too many enemies

  • Story of an assassination: the final hours of the president of Haiti

  • Capador: from “honorable military man” in Colombia to recruiter for the hitmen who assassinated Moïse

Moïse was shot 12 times on July 7 at his residence on Calle Pelerin, in Port-au-Prince, where he was spending the night with his wife, who was injured, and their two children. According to the investigation, the operation was perpetrated by a command of 24 Colombian mercenaries who did not encounter any type of resistance from the president's security team. In addition to the 18 detainees, three other men of that nationality died in clashes with the police after the crime and at least three more are believed to have escaped. Among those arrested there are also at least three Haitian police officers, allegedly involved in the assassination,while other agents and security guards of the president are in isolation but without formal charges against them and will have to give explanations of how the hitmen managed to perpetrate the plan apparently at ease.

There are also six Haitian civilians in detention, including three residents of South Florida, one of the main reception sites for the Haitian diaspora in the United States. One of them, Emmanuel Sanon, a doctor and evangelical pastor who aspired to replace Moïse in power, the authorities accused him of being the mastermind the same week as the crime. But in Haiti, it is hard to believe that this 63-year-old man who had lived in South Florida for 20 years and without connections in the highest spheres of the country is behind a plan of this magnitude. Later, the Colombian authorities - who are collaborating with the FBI in the investigation - identified one of the ten fugitives, Joseph Felix Badio, a former official of an anti-corruption agency of the Haitian Ministry of Justice,as the person who gave the order to the mercenaries to assassinate Moïse.

But the investigation is still full of inconsistencies and it is not clear who is the real mastermind or who could finance such an expensive operation: only the hiring and transfer of Colombian hitmen from their country to Haiti, with a previous stop in tourist places in the Republic. Dominican Republic, is estimated at hundreds of thousands of dollars. Following the trail of money and logistics to carry out the plot, two names of Latin Americans living in the Miami metropolitan area have also emerged: Antonio Intriago, a Venezuelan who runs the security company CTU Security, who allegedly hired the Colombian mercenaries. , and Walter Veintemilla, the Ecuadorian who runs Worldwide Capital Lending Group, a loan company that, according to authorities, Intriago and Sanon turned to to finance the operation.

Although the Haitian authorities have mentioned their names, no arrest warrant has been issued for any of them.

And while the Venezuelan has not been seen publicly since the beginning of July, the Ecuadorian's lawyer, Robert Nicholson, has told the

Miami Herald

newspaper

that his client granted two loans to Intriago's company and Sanon to carry out a plan to replace President Moïse in a peaceful transition of power.

"No plan was ever discussed or suggested that contemplated a violent overthrow of the Haitian government or assassinate the president," he said.

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"My life is in danger.

Come and save me "

The plot's connections with Latin America do not end there. Dimitri Hérard, the head of security at the National Palace, is in the crosshairs of the Colombian authorities, since in the last year he made several stops to that country as part of his trips to Ecuador, Panama and the Dominican Republic. Among the suspicions that weigh on him and President Moïse's head of security, Jean Laguel Civil, is how it is possible that no one in his team was injured in front of a heavily armed group and why, if the exterior of the house was strewn with casings, inside there were no signs of exchange of shots.

The

Miami Herald

newspaper

has revealed that on the night of his death, Moïse made several calls after 1:30 in the morning in an interval of ten minutes to the National Police in which he warned that they were shooting at his house and asked for help. "My life is in danger. Come quickly and save me, ”he said in one of those calls to an agent before the sound of an assault rifle was heard. Hours later, the judge in charge of the investigation, Carl Henry Destin, found the president's body shot in the forehead, chest, hip and stomach. In addition, the hitmen had gouged out an eye and he had some broken bones. The president died after ten minutes of torture and asking for help that never came.

His wife, Martine Moïse, who was injured, was transferred to Miami for medical treatment and has returned to the country for funerals, where she has appeared with one arm in a sling and a bulletproof vest at events in honor of her husband.

In a public statement, the woman thanked Haitians for their support and said she rejected the use of public money for the funeral, in which the new prime minister, Ariel Henry, participated.

In the days leading up to the wake, Moïse's followers have taken to the streets to demand justice.

With his body already buried, Henry faces the imminent challenge of stabilizing a country ravaged by political and social chaos and with a severe crisis of insecurity, a challenge that will go through ensuring that answers are found to the unknowns of the assassination.

A Colombian mission travels to Haiti

By Santiago Torrado



In Colombia, the authorities have collaborated from the outset but have been cautious when making announcements and avoided venturing hypotheses, stating that they respect the judicial autonomy of Haiti. Although the investigations are progressing, the role of the Colombian mercenaries –24 ex-military: 18 captured, three killed and the rest fugitives– has not been fully clarified. Amid the confusion, several family members have insisted that their relatives are respectable people who were hired as bodyguards, not hitmen, requesting legal assistance or repatriation of the bodies, which has not happened so far. The Colombian Foreign Ministry, which has asked to guarantee their physical integrity, has so far not been able to access the detainees,But he announced Wednesday that a consular mission will travel to the Caribbean nation between July 25 and 27 to assist them.


Although at least two of the ex-military men knew of the assassination and were a sort of recruiters, others would have traveled deceived, according to the investigations. "Regardless of the level of knowledge that was had, what remains in evidence is that there is a participation of all that group in that assassination," said the president, Iván Duque. Despite this recognition, their instructions, as explained by the vice president and chancellor, Marta Lucía Ramírez, have been “to provide them with all the support, so that they have legal assistance, to make sure that they are in adequate health conditions, that they are in a a place of detention that is adequate, that life is protected and that the rights and guarantees that due process should have are also protected ”.

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Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-07-23

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