The 38 people kidnapped in Port-au-Prince on Friday by a criminal group while traveling to southern Haiti were released on Saturday, a motoring association said.
The passengers who had been kidnapped were released and the two buses recovered on June 11,” wrote the Association of Drivers and Owners of Haiti (APCH) on the social network Twitter.
The APCH did not reveal whether the kidnappers demanded any ransom.
Thirty-six passengers and two drivers were kidnapped Friday morning by members of a group from the Village de Dieu, one of the slums of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.
Since June of last year, the authorities have lost control of the only road access linking the capital with an area in southern Haiti, since part of the national highway is under the control of armed groups.
The president of the APCH, Méhu Changeux, said on Friday that the association “always asks drivers not to use the road” until “security is restored.”
A call that is hardly heard by many inhabitants, since traveling by the only alternative route is much more expensive, said Méhu Changeux.
“There are still buses at risk,” he lamented.
In May alone, the United Nations (UN) recorded at least 200 kidnappings in Haiti, most of them in Port-au-Prince.
Source: Observadora
