Nearly 200 people were killed in brutal violence in the Haitian capital over the weekend, many in a massacre that reportedly targeted a group of Voodoo healers.
The killings of at least 110 people by a “powerful gang leader” were seen convinced his son’s illness was caused by religious followers, according to the civilian organization Committee for Peace and Development (CPD).
“He decided to cruelly punish all the old men and Voodoo doctors who, in his opinion, would be able to cast an evil spell on his son,” said the Haiti-based group. “The soldiers of the band were responsible for singling out the victims in their houses in order to take them to the king’s castle to kill them.”
UN rights commissioner Volker Turk said at least 184 people died in total over the weekend. “These latest massacres this year in Haiti take the death toll to a staggering five thousand people,” he told reporters in Geneva.
Both the CPD and the UN said the massacre took place in the seaside neighborhood of the city of Soleil in the western capital.
Haiti has suffered from decades of instability, but the situation escalated in February when armed groups staged attacks in the capital Port-au-Prince to overthrow then-Prime Minister Ariel Henry.
The gangs now control 80% of the city and, despite a Kenyan-led police mission backed by the US and the UN, violence has continued to escalate.
CPD said most of the victims of the violence that took place on Friday and Saturday were over 60, but some youths who tried to rescue others were also among the victims.
“Reliable sources in the community report that more than a hundred people were killed, their bodies mutilated and burned in the street,” the statement said.
More than 700,000 people are internally displaced in Haiti, half of them children, according to October figures from the UN International Organization for Migration.
Voodoo was brought to Haiti by slaves from Africa and is the salvation of the country’s culture. This was banned during French colonial rule and was only recognized as a public religion by the government in 2003.
While it incorporates elements of other religious beliefs, including Catholicism, Voodoo has historically been claimed by other religions.