Among other things, several gang members who have been charged in connection with the assassination of former president Jovenel Moïse in 2021 are in prison.
According to AP, around a hundred prisoners remain inside the prison, which is no longer guarded by guards and whose doors are ajar.
The incident at the prison, the largest in Haiti, was preceded by a several-hour exchange of gunfire between the police and heavily armed gang members.
Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere and has been thrown into a spiral of violence for some years now. The capital Port-au-Prince is controlled to 80 percent by criminal gangs, whose goal is to depose Prime Minister Ariel Henry and “liberate” the Haitian people.
The text is updated.