Haiti Kills Gang Chief as El Salvador, Mercenaries Add Pressure

Haitian officials said they had killed a major gang leader in the capital as private mercenaries and at least 2,000 El Salvadoran troops join the fight to regain control of the troubled Caribbean nation.

(Bloomberg) -- Haitian officials said they had killed a major gang leader in the capital as private mercenaries and at least 2,000 El Salvadoran troops join the fight to regain control of the troubled Caribbean nation. 

In a joint operation with other forces, Haiti’s National Police said they had attacked a gang stronghold in Cité Soleil and fatally wounded the leader of the “Boston” gang, Mathias Saintil, who died at a local hospital.

“One less gang leader,” Interim Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé wrote on X. “The gangs won’t be getting any sleep.”

Haiti’s gang crisis has drawn an array of international support, including the UN-backed Gang Suppression Force and a private military company run by Erik Prince, a former US Navy SEAL and founder of Blackwater. Prince suggested it was his contractors, known as the Task Force, and who work as a division within the national police, or HNP, that were responsible for the gang leader’s death. 

“Hail to the HNP Task Force,” he wrote on X in response to the Prime Minister’s message. “Nice shot.”

Haiti’s powerful gangs — which at some points have controlled more than 90% of the capital and forced more than 1.5 million people to flee their homes — are coming under increased pressure. 

Last month, after four El Salvadoran soldiers disappeared in Haiti and were presumed kidnapped, President Nayib Bukele began sending thousands of troops to the country and has vowed to crush the “wicked” gangs. 

On Wednesday he posted videos of El Salvadoran soldiers patrolling largely empty streets in Haiti. “It looks like the gangs don’t want to fight us,” he wrote on X.

Also last week, one of Haiti’s largest and most notorious gang leaders, Wilson Joseph of the 400 Marozo group, asked for the United Nations to establish peace talks.