They were kidnapped Saturday as they visited an orphanage near the capital of Port-au-Prince. Five of the kidnapped are children.
The State Department said negotiations are ongoing as violent gangs in Haiti assert more control after the murder of the country’s president in July.
The Ohio-based “Christian Aid Ministries” posted on its website: “The group of sixteen U.S citizens and one Canadian citizen includes five men, seven women, and five children. Join us in praying for those who are being held hostage.”
Kidnappings and killings in Haiti have been on the rise after the assassination of the country’s president in July.
Armed gangs are believed to control about half the city of Port-au-Prince.
Tessa Petitt with the Florida Immigration Coalition said, “They’ve been walking into churches to kidnap preachers and parishioners on Sundays in broad daylight.”
Police say the group responsible—400 Mawozo—is the same gang which abducted five French priests and two nuns in April. They were ultimately released.
A senior state department official told NBC News: “We are engaging with Haitian authorities at the senior-most levels.”
People familiar with the situation say violence and lawlessness has only gotten worse after Haiti’s president was killed and August’s devastating earthquake.
The Haitian Times Founder Gary Pierre-Pierre said, “When you assassinate the president, there’s no authority running the country, you have a very weak prime minister, then there’s a power vacuum and then when the other power vacuums, the gangs they stepped up to fill that void.”
Congressman Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) promised a robust response from the U.S. government. He said, “We keep them in our prayers and leave the United States government, I’ll do everything we can to get them back.”
At least 328 kidnapping victims were reported to Haiti’s national police by September. That’s nearly 100 more people than were reported abducted than in 2020.
© 2024 KOBI-TV NBC5. All rights reserved unless otherwise stated.