Haiti

PORT-AU-PRINCE/HAVANA, Aug 14 (Reuters) - A major earthquake reduced buildings to rubble and caused at least several fatalities in southwestern Haiti on Saturday, sending shock waves across the Caribbean, where people fled their homes for fear they might collapse.

The 7.2-magnitude quake, which was followed by a series of aftershocks, struck 8 km (5 miles) from the town of Petit Trou de Nippes, about 150 km west of the capital Port-au-Prince, at a depth of 10 km, the USGS said.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, July 30 (Reuters) - Haitian police on Friday outlined fresh accusations against a former Supreme Court judge over her links to the assassination of President Jovenel Moise earlier this month, saying she had met with some Colombian mercenaries accused of killing him.

The assassination of Moise has plunged the Western hemisphere's poorest nation deeper into chaos, and launched an international manhunt for mercenaries and the murder masterminds across the Americas.

QUARTIER-MORIN, Haiti (AP) — Hundreds of workers fled businesses in northern Haiti on Wednesday after demonstrations near the hometown of assassinated President Jovenel Moïse grew violent ahead of his funeral.

Associated Press journalists observed the body of one man who witnesses said was shot in the community of Quartier-Morin, which is near Trou-du-Nord, where Moïse was born. Roadblocks were set up between the two communities, temporarily barring cars from entering or leaving as two plumes of thick, black smoke rose nearby.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti’s police chief on Wednesday accused a Venezuelan businessman who owns a security company in Florida of traveling to Haiti numerous times as part of a plot to assassinate President Jovenel Moïse, who was killed last week.

Léon Charles, head of the Haiti’s National Police, said Antonio Intriago of CTU Security signed a contract while in Haiti but provided no other details and offered no evidence.

“The investigation is very advanced,” Charles said.

Intriago could not be immediately reached for comment.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — A physician. A church pastor. A failed Florida businessman who filed for bankruptcy.

New details that have emerged about a man considered a key player in the killing of Haiti’s president deepened the mystery over the assassination that shocked this nation of more than 11 million people as it faces an uncertain future.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti’s interim government said it asked the U.S. to deploy troops to protect key infrastructure as it tries to stabilize the country and prepare the way for elections in the aftermath of President Jovenel Moïse’s assassination.

“We definitely need assistance and we’ve asked our international partners for help,” Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph told The Associated Press in a phone interview late Friday. “We believe our partners can assist the national police in resolving the situation.”

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Seventeen suspects have been detained so far in the stunning assassination of Haiti’s president, and Haitian authorities say two are believed to hold dual U.S.-Haitian citizenship and Colombia’s government says at least six are former members of its army.

Léon Charles, chief of Haiti’s National Police, said Thursday night that 15 of the detainees were from Colombia.

The police chief said eight more suspects were being sought and three others had been killed by police. Charles had earlier said seven were killed.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — An already struggling and chaotic Haiti stumbled into an uncertain future Thursday, reeling from the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse followed by a reported gunbattle in which authorities said police killed four suspects in the murder, detained two others and freed three officers being held hostage.

Officials pledged to find all those responsible for the predawn raid on Moïse’s house early Wednesday that left the president shot to death and his wife, Martine Moïse, critically wounded. She was flown to Miami for treatment.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, July 7 (Reuters) - Haitian President Jovenel Moise was shot dead by unidentified attackers in his private residence overnight in an "inhuman and barbaric act" and his wife was injured, Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph said on Wednesday.

He said the police and army had the security situation under control but gunshots could be heard throughout the capital after the attack, which occurred amid a rising wave of politically linked violence in the impoverished Caribbean nation.

(Reuters) --- For more than a year, Haiti escaped the worst ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic, reporting few cases and fatalities - a rare break for the poorest country in the Americas, which has so often been beset by misfortune.

COVID-19 treatment centers closed for lack of patients, Haitians resumed life as normal, and the government hesitated to even accept its allotment of free AstraZeneca vaccines through the U.N.-backed COVAX mechanism due to safety and logistical concerns.