Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Port-au-Prince (Agenzia Fides) - "The Haitian people are a martyred people (...) and the Church that is in communion with this people lives this suffering in its flesh", said Father Marc-Henry Siméon, spokesman for the Haitian Episcopal Conference, in a television debate broadcast by Radio Télé Métropole, on Sunday 13 April. Referring to the assassination of Sister Evanette Onezaire and Sister Jeanne Voltaire, of the Little Sisters of Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, killed on March 31 in Mirebalais about fifty kilometers north-east of the capital Port-au-Prince (see Fides, 3/4/2025), Father Siméon said that the security conditions in Mirebalais are so precarious that they have not yet made it possible to recover the bodies of the two nuns in order to offer them dignified funeral services.
About a year after the installation of the Transitional Presidential Council (TPC), the priest draws a gloomy balance of the achievements of this body, which was supposed to bring the country out of the insecurity caused by the criminal gangs that have been raging in the country for years. "The state is progressively collapsing, leaving is gradually collapsing, leaving the door open to the gangs that are extending their grip, especially on the capital," he said.
Faced with what he calls a collective failure, Father Siméon calls for a moral revolution instead of a brutal revolt. He urges political leaders to conduct a sincere self-assessment and open an inclusive dialogue to find a credible solution to the crisis. "Those who have failed will never walk away from power alone."
According to the UN, there are more than a million displaced people in Haiti, a number that has tripled in the space of a year. Gang violence in the capital Port-au-Prince has forced thousands of families to flee several times. According to the United Nations, in the first three months of the year at least 1,518 people died and 572 were injured due to gang violence, law enforcement operations and self-defense militias. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides, 16/4/2025)
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