According to rights organization CARDH, there were at least 389 kidnappings reported in Haiti in the first three months of this year, a triple rise from the same period in 2022 as criminals try to make up for losses from international sanctions.
More than three times as many kidnappings as the 127 CARDH reported in the previous quarter and a 72% rise from the same time last year were reported between January and March.
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In a study, the Port-au-Prince-based human rights research organization said that the “exponential increase” may be the result of a need to make up for losses brought on by late-2017 international sanctions.
A number of prominent politicians and businesses have been sanctioned by nations like the United States and Canada on the suspicion that they are aiding in the funding and supply of well-armed gangs that are now thought to rule the majority of the nation.
According to CARDH, the rise might also be the result of new gang alliances formed as they expand their territorial control, which would open up new markets for the “kidnapping industry.”
The group also pointed to the possibility of future elections and the growth of civilian defense organizations defending neighborhoods from gangs in place of a police force that was under-equipped and was thus vulnerable to gang reprisal.
According to the report, “Gangs use extreme violence (all forms of torture) to force parents and families to pay large sums of U.S. money that they do not have,” It included hangings, gang rapes, and severe burns as examples of this.
Several ransom payments are often requested from relatives, it continued.
29 of the 389 victims of kidnappings that CARDH tracked were from other nations. According to the U.S. State Department, it is in touch with Haitian authorities over the kidnapping of a Florida couple on March 18 when they were visiting relatives.
In comparison to 2021, when President Jovenel Moise was slain and a power vacuum resulted, CARDH identified 857 kidnappings during 2022, down from the 1,009 it had previously noted.
