PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) – A former rebel leader who is wanted on U.S. drug charges, and was recently elected to the Haitian Senate, was arrested Thursday as he appeared on a live radio talk show, a witness said.
Guy Philippe was being interviewed live on the show with another recently elected lawmaker when the host abruptly announced that police were outside the studio in the Petionville district of the capital to arrest him. The host came back on air and said that authorities had taken him away.
Radio host Gary-Pierre Paul Charles later told The Associated Press the police were members of the Haitian anti-drug unit and fired shots into the air to disperse a crowd that had gathered.
“It was shocking. People were running everywhere,” he told the AP.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which barely missed capturing him in a 2007 raid, had no immediate comment on the arrest and it wasn’t clear whether he was going to be extradited. Authorities in Haiti and Philippe’s lawyer could not immediately be reached for comment.