Image copyright Reuters Image caption The five missionaries are being held hostage by Haitians tied to the drug gang The Knights Templar
The self-styled leader of a gang of Haitian farmers who kidnapped six Christian missionaries has threatened to kill them.
Philippe Guimard, whose Knights Templar have held the five adults and two children for three days, made the threat in a video made available to local media.
The mother and brother of the group’s Florida-based leader Tony Palme were arrested along with the missionaries and their driver.
The group was on a mission to learn Creole before establishing a Christian school in Haiti.
The earthquake in 2010 left hundreds of thousands homeless in an area with limited resources, including police and much needed housing, and a thriving, quasi-private security force has sprouted up to protect locals.
These criminal gangs are also using violence to try to extort money and even gain control of local economies by kidnapping members of the community and demanding ransom from their families.
These gangs operate independently and defend their demands as legitimate.
The situation is compounded by Haiti’s failure to establish a functioning national police force, which many economists blame for growing levels of crime and corruption.
The country is also dealing with an ongoing humanitarian crisis, as it struggles to recover from a series of damaging hurricanes.
Christian aid agencies have been criticised for supporting Haiti in these difficult times, despite the army’s absence from the streets and the poor state of law enforcement in much of the country.
[Ms Farley’s Pueblo community in Haiti, known as the Sucre, can be seen at the upper left of this article.]
Originally published in BBC News
