Powerful gang boss wades into Haiti turmoil

One of Haiti's most powerful gang leaders said on Saturday (July 10) his men would take to the streets to protest the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, threatening to pitch the impoverished Caribbean country deeper into chaos.

Emily Wither reports.

He is one of Haiti's most powerful gang leaders and his threats risk plunging Haiti into deeper chaos.

Jimmy Cherizier, a former cop known as Barbecue, heads the so-called G9 federation of nine gangs.

In a new video address he says his men would take to the streets to protest the assassination of President Jovenel Moise.

"Many people from the opposition and stinking bourgeoisie joined together to betray the President.

It is a national and international conspiracy against the Haitian people.

I ask all the groups (gangs) to mobilize.

Take to the streets.

We demand explanations about the assassination of the President.

We had a problem with the President, but we have never said that foreigners can enter our territory to kill the President." Moise was gunned down before dawn on Wednesday (July 7) at his Port-au-Prince home.

Haitian authorities say a unit of trained assassins comprising 26 Colombians and two Haitian Americans carried out the murder.

The murder and the still murky plot behind it has caused further political instability in the long-troubled country.

The government is calling for U.S. and U.N.

Assistance.

The U.S. says it has no plans to provide Haiti with military assistance for now while the request to the UN would need Security Council authorization.

Cherizier says his followers will practice "legitimate violence".

And that it's time for "the masters of the system" - business magnates of Syrian and Lebanese descent who dominate parts of the economy - to "give back" the country.

Some of the magnates had been at loggerheads with Moise.

Meanwhile in a taped recording Moise's widow Martine- who was also wounded in the attack- accused shadowy enemies of plotting his assassination to thwart democratic change.

She says her husband had spoken of dark forces behind years of unrest - rivals and oligarchs angry about what he called his attempts to clean up government contracts and politics.

Haitian officials have not provided a motive for the assassination or explained how the killers got past Moise's security detail.