PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, June 9, (AP): Haiti’s newly selected prime minister, Garry Conille, was hospitalized late Saturday in the capital of Port-au-Prince just days after arriving in the country, the government said.
It wasn’t immediately known why Conille was hospitalized.
The office of the prime minister said in a statement that Conille was feeling slightly unwell "following a week of intense activities.” It did not provide further details except to say that Conille was stable and that he thanked those who visited him and wished him well.
Louis Gérald Gilles, a member of the transitional presidential council that recently chose Conille as leader of the troubled Caribbean country, told The Associated Press that he was at the hospital but unable to provide further information.
A person close to Conille, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, told AP that he was with the prime minister when he noticed Conille, who he said is asthmatic and sometimes uses an inhaler, appeared to have trouble breathing. The person said he called high-ranking officials and told them Conille needed to be taken to the hospital.
A spokesman for Conille did not return messages for comment.
AP journalists observed high-ranking officials entering the hospital, including Frantz Elbé, director of Haiti's National Police. Also present was Bruno Maes, UNICEF's representative in Haiti.
A handful of curious onlookers gathered outside the hospital as authorities blocked the street with tinted-glass SUVs.
Conille was chosen as prime minister May 28 after a convoluted selection process. He faces an arduous task as Haiti's newest leader, including quelling widespread gang violence as the country prepares for the UN-backed deployment of a Kenyan police force, a move that was delayed in part because Haiti lacked a premier after former Prime Minister Ariel Henry stepped down April 25.