HAITI: Haitian police have said that a hit squad consisting of 28 trained killers assassinated Haiti’s President Jovenel Moïse earlier this week, BBC has reported.

According to the police, 28 of them were Colombians and two were Americans of Haitian origin.

Eight of the suspects are still on the run, while police have arrested 17, including the two Americans, BBC reported.

The remaining suspects were shot dead during gun battles with the police in the capital Port-au-Prince, it said.

The gunmen burst into the president’s private residence in the early hours of Wednesday.

Moïse’s wife, Martine, was injured in the attack and was flown to Florida for treatment, according to the report.

It is not yet clear who planned the attack or what motivated it, the report said adding that Haiti’s interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph, however, said that the 53-year-old president may have been targeted because he was fighting “oligarchs” in the country.

(With inputs from BBC)