(Port-au-Prince, Haiti) The gang that on Saturday kidnapped 17 people associated with a United States-based Christian aid group in Haiti demanded a ransom of $ 1 million for each of the people it detains, the country’s justice minister, Liszt Quitel, said on Tuesday.
Local authorities said the kidnapped group, made up of 16 Americans and one Canadian, were captured in a suburb of Port-au-Prince. Five children, including a 2-year-old, are among those kidnapped.
“The request was made to the Christian Aid Ministries group – they asked for a million dollars per person,” Quitel said in a telephone interview. “Often these gangs know that these demands cannot be met and they consider a counter offer from families, and negotiations can take a few days or a few weeks. ”
As far as he knows, he said, the gang has not issued a deadline for the payment.
the Wall Street Journal had previously reported on this ransom demand.
Haiti has been in the throes of political upheaval for years, and kidnappings of rich and poor alike are alarmingly frequent. But even in a country accustomed to widespread anarchy, the kidnapping of such a large group shocked the authorities with its audacity.
Violence is on the rise in the capital, Port-au-Prince, which is controlled by gangs. By some estimates, gangs now control almost half of the city. On Monday, gangs shot at a school bus in Port-au-Prince, injuring at least five people, including students, while another public bus was also hijacked by a gang.
The security crisis comes in the wake of a deep political crisis in Haiti. Two years ago, demonstrators denounced widespread corruption and demanded the ouster of President Jovenel Moïse, which paralyzed the country. The stalemate has prevented sick people from seeking treatment in hospitals, children from going to school, workers from scarce jobs available and even caused blackouts in parts of the country.
Since then, the gangs have only become more assertive. They do what they want, kidnapping children on their way to school and pastors in the middle of a sermon.
The gang which police say kidnapped the 17 missionaries and their families is one of the most dangerous in the country and one of the first to engage in mass kidnappings.
The gang, known as “400 Mawozo”, controls the area where the missionaries were kidnapped, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, the capital. The group has been sowing terror there for several months, engaging in armed clashes with rival gangs and kidnapping businessmen and police officers.
The gang has taken kidnapping to a new level in Haiti, abducting people en masse as they take the bus or walk the streets in groups whose numbers could once have protected them.
The gang was accused of kidnapping five priests and two nuns earlier this year. He also allegedly killed Anderson Belony, a famous sculptor, on Tuesday, according to local media. Belony had worked to improve his impoverished community.
Croix-des-Bouquets, one of the suburbs now controlled by the gang, has become an almost ghost town, with many residents fleeing the daily violence.
In this once bustling neighborhood, you can no longer find the poor street vendors lining the sidewalks, some of whom were kidnapped by the gang for what little they had in their pockets or had to sell the few goods they had in their homes. , including radios or refrigerators, to pay the ransom.
Gangs have been rampant in Port-au-Prince for the past two decades, but they were often used for political purposes – such as voter suppression – by powerful politicians. They have become a seemingly out of control force, thriving in the economic malaise and desperation that worsens each year, with independent gangs mushrooming in the capital.
This text was translated from New York Times
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