Thanks to nhop.ca!
Haiti’s having a pretty hard time right now, since the massive earthquake earlier this month.
Fortunately, a lot of good people from around the world are trying to help… with food, money, kidnapping… KIDNAPPING?!?!
Ten U.S. Baptist missionaries were charged with kidnapping 33 Haitian children and trying to take them across the Haitian border to the Dominican Republic.
The Haitian Prime Minister, Max Bellerive, states,
It is clear now that they were trying to cross the border without papers. It is clear now that some of the children have live parents… And it is clear now, that they knew what they were doing was wrong.
According to ABC News, children were drawn to follow the missionaries with pictures – pamphlets, actually – that showed pools, large houses, and clothes.
The children, although allegedly being taken to an orphanage, were not orphans.
Human trafficking* is a serious world wide problem.
Like these children, victims of trafficking are tricked with offers of work or money in a different country. Upon arrival, the traffickers will hide important documents, threaten the victims families, and force them into work, usually hard labor or sex slavery.
In Haiti, these trafficked children are called restaveks.
So, were these missionaries tricking kids? Or trying to help kids, all between the ages of 2 and 12?
Well, we’re not quite sure yet. Either way, taking a child out of a country, a child who has parents, without papers or legal authority is just not ok.
Even before that catastrophe, Haiti had more than 300,000 orphaned or abandoned children vulnerable to exploitation by human traffickers masquerading as relief organizations or aid workers, and the country’s notoriously corrupt government too often turned a blind eye to the trade in human lives.
All of this sounds really scary…and it is.
What’s even worse is that there’s been a serious connection found between environmental tragedies and human trafficking. Actually, environmental devastation usually impacts the most vulnerable the most, leaving them even more open to abuse.
The Huffington Post writes,
A recent report from SOS Children’s Villages points out that there is a correlation between humanitarian crises and spikes in sexual violence against women. In light of the number of orphaned children and displaced people, many organizations including UNICEF are concerned about a potential increase in trafficking in persons in the current chaos.
Haiti continues to need, and will continue to need, all of our help. Follow any of these links to help Haiti through difficult times!
How big of issue is this in US?