Spanish
New York.- The U.S. State Department on Tuesday increased to five million dollars the reward for anyone who reveals the whereabouts or facilitates the arrest of Jimmy Cherizier, alias Barbecue, the most notorious leader of the armed gangs in Haiti.
The reward (which increases to five the two million dollars previously offered) is made public after Haiti declared a state of emergency for three months following an escalation of violence that seems to have no end and that makes 90% of the capital, Port-au-Prince, under the effective control of criminal gangs.
Last Thursday, Cherizier vowed to "overthrow" the Presidential Transition Council, the body trying to return the country to relative normality, starting with the holding of elections at the end of this year.
You can read: Netanyahu rejects the option of a partial agreement with Hamas
The reward for the capture of Barbecue was justified by prosecutor Jeanine Ferris, of the District of Columbia: "He is the gang leader responsible for heinous human rights abuses, including violence against American citizens in Haiti (...) Our office is committed to ensuring the safety of Americans anywhere in the world, and the violence plaguing Haiti must end." Both Cherizier and his ally Bazile Richardson, alias Fredo -a Haitian naturalized American-, have been charged with one count of conspiracy for the illegal transfer of funds from the U.S. to finance the activities of Barbecue's gang, Viv Ansanm, "in violation of U.S. sanctions".
