The bodies had been whisked away but the dried pool of blood covering the dirt-floor dead end of a twisting alley was a chilling sign of what happened here last week.

Residents in the National Fort district, which like most of Port-au-Prince’s slums is a bastion of support for former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, gathered around the darkening blood the following day. Some, who were afraid to give their names, said policemen wearing black masks had shot and killed 12 people, then dragged their bodies away. At least three families have identified the bodies of relatives at the mortuary; others who have loved ones missing fear the worst.

‘The police officers will say that this was an operation against gangs. But we are all innocent,’ said Eliphete Joseph, a young man in a blue basketball jersey who claimed to be a friend of several of those killed, his eyes red with grief as he stood in the shadow of a crumbling concrete staircase. ‘The worst thing is that Aristide is now in exile far from here in South Africa, but we are in Haiti, and they are persecuting us only because we live in a poor neighbourhood.’

A police spokesperson confirmed there had been a police raid at National Fort looking for gang leaders and that at least eight people were killed.

The killings appear to be the latest example of what human rights groups describe as a campaign of repression against suspected supporters of Aristide, who was escorted out of the country on 29 February by US Marines. The US government said he resigned. Aristide says he was forced out in a US-backed coup.
Full Article: observor.guardian.co.uk

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