PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti (CMC) — The Association of Haitian Journalists has written to Central Directorate of the Judicial Police’s (DCPJ) Inspector General Pierre René François, requesting a meeting amid allegations that some journalists had links to the criminal gangs operating in the French-speaking Caribbean Community country.

In the letter the association commended the work of the DCPJ in the fight against crime, noting that the criminal gangs “have plunged the country into an unprecedented security and humanitarian crisis”.

“As part of the actions of the DCPJ, press workers are arrested. Others are identified in a document dated July 15, 2024 and attributed to the Criminal Affairs Bureau of the Central Directorate of the Judicial Police.

“The association, in its mission to ensure respect for freedom of the press and the ethical and disciplinary rules governing the exercise of the profession of journalist, requests from you an information meeting around these files that are making headlines in the media,” Secretary General Jacques Desrosiers wrote.

Desrosiers said that the approach of the association does not include efforts to influence or interfere in the work of the DPCJ but “will allow the association to gather elements for an objective assessment of the situation of these press workers”.

Haiti has been without an elected head of State since July 7, 2021 when Jovenel Moise was assassinated at his private residence overlooking Port au Prince.

The United Nations says gang violence has displaced more than 578,000 Haitians, while nearly five million — almost half the population of 11.7 million — are facing acute hunger, with 1.6 million of those people at risk of starvation.

Haiti has also benefited from the deployment of police officers from Kenya under the United Nations-sanctioned mission to combat powerful armed gangs that have wreaked turmoil in the Caribbean country.

Head of the Transitional Presidential Council (TPC) in Haiti, Edgard Leblanc Fils said that he expects presidential and legislative elections to be held by the end of 2025.