Roving bands of looters on Monday overran Port-au-Prince, while police and military officials tasked with protecting the quake-stricken Haitian capital were nowhere to be found.
World leaders have promised to dispatch additional police, troops, marines and UN peacekeepers to the Haitian capital which has spiraled into chaos and despair after being leveled by a massive earthquake nearly a week ago.
But for now, the commercial heart of Haiti's shattered capital remains firmly in the hands of the thieves and vandals, who make off with whatever they can carry that has not been damaged beyond use.
Looters roamed from shop to shop, some clearly survivors scavenging for food and water as the unrest across the region was stoked by a delay in supplies reaching hundreds of thousands of people desperate for aid.
But others on the rampage in Port-au-Prince's shopping zone appeared to be simply marauders availing themselves of whatever items they might be able to use or sell at a later time.
The pillagers in downtown Port-au-Prince targeted a fabric store in relatively good condition and whose wares had not yet been despoiled.
A band of about 10 masked men managed to scale the rubble to gain access to the building's interior, where they made off with large bolts of fabric hoisted on their shoulders.
Widespread looting on Sunday led Haitian police to open fire on a crowd in the capital, killing at least one man who was shot in the head, as others ransacked a supermarket.
"Incidents of violence and looting are on the rise as the desperation grows," warned the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
Roaming gangs of looters steal anything they can find -- sneakers, fabric, music stereos -- everything is up for grabs.
International officials overseeing relief operations on Monday said they were painfully aware of the need for additional troops and police to get vital aid to the quake survivors -- and to restore a semblance of order as Haiti struggles to emerge from the worst catastrophe to befall the poor Caribbean nation. http://www.business24-7.ae/Articles/2010/1/Pages/Looterspreyuponquake-ravagedHaitiancapital.aspx
i found a simple free way to add the pictures in a way that doesn't use other peoples bandwidth . i just save them to the public area of my drop box cloud. then link to them from there.
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http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/01/haiti_48_hours_later.html
