Gang with past abductions accused of kidnapping missionaries – The Denver Post

By DÁNICA COTO and EVENS SANON

PORT-AU PRINCE, Haiti (AP) – A gang accused of kidnapping five priests and two nuns earlier this year in Haiti is now accused of kidnapping 17 missionaries from a US organization, including a 2- year old, police said Sunday.

The 400 Mawozo gang kidnapped the group – which also included some elderly people – in Ganthier, a municipality east of the capital of Port-au-Prince, Haitian police inspector Frantz Champagne told the Associated Press.

The gang, whose name roughly translates to 400 “inexperienced men”, controls the Croix-des-Bouquets area, which includes Ganthier, where they carry out kidnappings and carjackings and blackmail business owners, according to authorities.

Haiti is once again battling a rise in gang-related kidnappings that had fallen in recent months after President Jovenel Moïse was fatally shot in his private residence on July 7 and a magnitude 7.2 earthquake killed more than 2,200 people in August .

The missionaries were on their way home Saturday from building an orphanage, according to a statement from Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries sent to various religious missions.

“This is a special prayer alert,” the message read in one minute. “Pray that the gang members will repent.”

The message says the mission director of the mission works with the U.S. embassy and that the field director’s family and another unidentified man remained at the ministry base while everyone else visited the orphanage.

No other details were immediately available.

A spokesman for the U.S. government said officials were aware of the reports of the kidnapping.

“Welfare and security for U.S. citizens abroad is one of the State Department’s highest priorities,” the spokesman said, rejecting further comments.

Meanwhile, a senior U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the United States is in contact with Haitian authorities to try to resolve the matter.

Bands have demanded ransoms ranging from a few hundred dollars to more than $ 1 million, according to authorities.

Last month, a deacon was killed in front of a church in the capital Port-au-Prince and his wife kidnapped, one out of dozens of people who have been abducted in recent months.

At least 328 kidnapping victims were reported to Haiti’s national police in the first eight months of 2021, compared to a total of 234 for the whole of 2020, according to a report released last month by the UN Integrated Office in Haiti known as BINUH.

Bands have been accused of kidnapping schoolchildren, doctors, police, busloads of passengers and others as they become more powerful. In April, a man who claimed to be the gang leader of 400 Mawozo told a radio station that they were the ones responsible for kidnapping five priests, two nuns and three relatives of one of the priests that month. They were later released.

A protest is scheduled for Monday to deter the country’s lack of security.

“Political unrest, the rise of gang violence, deteriorating socio-economic conditions – including food security and malnutrition – all contribute to the deterioration of the humanitarian situation,” BINUH said in its report. “An overworked and under-resourced police force alone cannot deal with Haiti’s security diseases.”

On Friday, the UN Security Council voted unanimously to extend the UN political mission in Haiti.

The kidnapping of the missionaries comes just days after U.S. high-ranking officials visited Haiti and promised more resources to Haiti’s national police, including an additional $ 15 million to reduce gang violence, which this year has displaced thousands of Haitians now living. in temporary shelters in increasingly unhygienic conditions.

Among those who met with Haiti’s police chief was Uzra Zeya, USA under the Secretary of State for Civil Security, Democracy and Human Rights.

“Eliminating violent gangs is crucial to Haitian stability and the security of its citizens,” she tweeted recently.

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Coto reported from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Matthew Lee of Washington contributed to this report.