Haiti's minister of elections and interparty relations, Mathias Pierre, identified the Haitian-American suspects as James Solages, 35, and Joseph Vincent, 55.
A State Department spokesman could not confirm if any U.S. citizens were among those detained, but U.S. authorities were in contact with Haitian officials, including investigators, to discuss how the United States could assist.
The Colombian defense minister said that initial findings indicate that the Colombians involved are retired members of the Colombian military, and he has given instructions to fully collaborate with the Haitian investigation.Jorge Luis Vargas, director of Colombia's national police, said he had received information requests from Haiti on six suspects, two of whom had apparently been killed in an exchange with Haitian police. The other four were under arrest."We blocked them en route as they left the scene of the crime," he said. "Since then, we have been battling with them.""They will be killed or apprehended."Haiti Elections Minister Mathias Pierre said a group of 26 people in commando were involved in the assassination.Moise, a 53-year-old former businessman who took office in 2017, was shot dead and his wife, Martine Moise, was seriously wounded when heavily armed assassins stormed the couple's home in the hills above Port-au-Prince at around 1 a.m. local time (0500 GMT).Haiti's ambassador to the United States, Bocchit Edmond, told Reuters in an interview the gunmen were masquerading as US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents as they entered Moise's guarded residence under cover of nightfall - a move that would likely have helped them gain entry.The brazen assassination, which drew condemnation from the UN Security Council, the United States and neighboring Latin American countries, came amid political unrest, a surge in gang violence, and a growing humanitarian crisis in the poorest nation in the Americas.The government declared a two-week state of emergency to help it hunt down the assassins, whom Edmond described as a group of "foreign mercenaries" and well-trained killers.The gunmen spoke English and Spanish, said interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, who assumed the leadership of the country, where the majority speak French or Haitian Creole."I am calling for calm. Everything is under control," Joseph said on television alongside Police General Director Charles. "This barbaric act will not remain unpunished."The first lady had been airlifted to Florida for treatment, where she was in a stable condition, Joseph said.Haiti, a country of about 11 million people, has struggled to achieve stability since the fall of the Duvalier dynastic dictatorship in 1986, and has grappled with a series of coups and foreign interventions.The UN Security Council condemned Moise's assassination and called on all parties to "remain calm, exercise restraint and to avoid any act that could contribute to further instability." The council is due to be briefed on the killing in a closed-door meeting on Thursday.US President Joe Biden denounced the killing as "heinous" and called the situation in Haiti - which lies some 700 miles (1,125 km) off the Florida coast - worrisome."We stand ready to assist as we continue to work for a safe and secure Haiti," he said.US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in a call with Joseph, expressed Washington's commitment to work with Haiti's government to support "democratic governance, peace, and security," State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in a statement.Many people in Haiti had wanted Moise to leave office. Ever since he took over in 2017, he faced calls to resign and mass protests - first over corruption allegations and his management of the economy, then over his increasing grip on power.Lately, he presided over a worsening state of gang violence that rights activists say is linked to politics and business leaders using armed groups for their own ends.In recent months, many districts of the capital Port-au-Prince had become no-go zones and one of Haiti's most powerful gang leaders warned he was launching a revolution against the country's business and political elites - although rights activists said he was more linked to Moise than the opposition.Moise himself had talked of dark forces at play behind the unrest: fellow politicians and corrupt oligarchs unhappy with his attempts to clean up government contracts and to reform Haitian politics. He provided no proof of this.