"Assassin Uses English and Spanish"...Foreign Mercenary Suspected
Controversy Continues Over Acting President Authority...Concerns Over Prolonged Anarchy
[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunwoo Lee] The assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Mo?se (pictured) by armed assailants at his residence in the Caribbean has sent shockwaves through the international community. The perpetrators, believed to be foreign mercenaries, remain unidentified, fueling various diplomatic controversies.
According to the Associated Press on the 7th (local time), Claude Joseph, Haiti's interim Prime Minister, officially announced at a press conference that "unknown assailants broke into President Mo?se's residence around 1 a.m. and fatally shot the president." He condemned the incident as "an inhumane and barbaric act." Following an emergency cabinet meeting, Joseph declared a state of emergency across Haiti and tightened control measures. The international airport in the capital, Port-au-Prince, was also closed, canceling all flights to and from Haiti.
Expressions of shock and condolences have poured in from the international community. Ant?nio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN), issued a statement immediately after the incident urging "all Haitian people to unite and reject violence in the face of this heinous act." The UN Security Council is scheduled to hold an emergency meeting on the 8th to discuss the situation in Haiti.
U.S. President Joe Biden also released a statement of condolence, saying, "I am saddened and shocked by the horrific assassination of President Mo?se and the attack on the First Lady," and condemned the "heinous act," expressing sincere wishes for the First Lady's recovery.
Controversy continues over who is behind the incident. While no evidence has yet identified the mastermind, during the press conference, Interim Prime Minister Joseph suggested that the assailants were highly trained and heavily armed individuals who spoke English and Spanish instead of Haiti's official languages, French and Creole, implying they were foreign mercenaries, which intensified the controversy.
Some foreign media released videos showing the assassins impersonating agents of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), sparking diplomatic tensions with the United States. The U.S. daily Miami Herald reported, "In footage taken during the incident, someone is seen impersonating a DEA agent speaking English with an American accent." Following the report, the U.S. State Department issued a statement strongly denying the claim, calling it "completely false" that the assassins were DEA agents.
Meanwhile, Franck Exantus, Haiti's Deputy Minister of Communication, announced on his Twitter account that "(President Mo?se's) assassination suspects have been apprehended by the police." He added that detailed information would be released soon.
Haiti, already suffering from severe political instability, faces fears of descending into anarchy amid extreme chaos ahead of the presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for September. Political turmoil is expected to worsen as the country approaches the September elections and a constitutional referendum.
According to CNN, Haiti's constitution stipulates that the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court should act as interim president in the event of the president's incapacitation. However, the position is currently vacant after Chief Justice Ren? Sylvestre died last month from COVID-19. Interim Prime Minister Joseph, who has announced plans to form a provisional cabinet and act as interim president until the September elections, faces controversy as his term as prime minister was set to expire on the 8th.
Wilner Morin, president of the Haitian Association of Judges (NAHJ), told CNN, "In the absence of a Chief Justice, it is theoretically the principle that Interim Prime Minister Joseph should formally succeed to the presidency, but even this is uncertain now," explaining, "For him to succeed to the presidency, parliamentary approval is required, but the parliament is completely paralyzed."
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