PORT-AU-PRINCE, Jan 14 (Reuters) – Haitian security forces on Wednesday bombed three houses belonging to top gang leader Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, local outlet Gazette Haiti reported on Wednesday, after unverified footage showed a large explosion in the capital Port-au-Prince.
The footage shared earlier online showed a large explosion destroying at least one building and affecting nearby houses, with a large smoke cloud released into the air. It was not immediately clear if anyone was killed, injured or arrested in the operation.
Gazette Haiti reported that after the bombing, police entered and recovered equipment.
Hours earlier, Haiti’s National Police said it was carrying out an operation targeting the house of gang leader Cherizier in Port-au-Prince’s Delmas 6 neighborhood, a longtime stronghold for armed groups working under Cherizier.
A former police officer, Cherizier, 48, has become a leader and spokesman for Viv Ansanm, a coalition of armed groups bringing together most of the criminal gangs in the capital, which has been locked in a violent conflict against police.
Police said the operation brought together the army, the U.N.-backed Gang Suppression Force, the prime minister’s task force – which has been running explosive drone operations for nearly a year – and a private military company.
The company Vectus Global, run by Blackwater founder Erik Prince, has been supporting Haiti’s government with the drone operations since early last year.
Cherizier was the first of a handful of Haitian gang leaders to be sanctioned by the United Nations and the U.S. has a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest or capture.
The gang leader, accused of a wide range of crimes including ordering several massacres around the capital, has branded himself as an anti-elite revolutionary and sought to transform Viv Ansanm into a political party.
The operation comes several weeks ahead of the February 7 deadline for the current transitional government’s mandate to end. A plan for Haiti’s political succession next month has not yet been announced.
(Reporting by Harold Isaac and Sarah Morland; Editing by Brendan O’Boyle and Daina Beth Solomon)
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