GH News Story

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by Mace Walgrave0 views·Updated Oct 20, 2021
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  1. Hello everybody.
  2. My name is May Seawall grave.
  3. And for my global news story, I thought I would
  4. go ahead and discuss the most recent piece of news
  5. that I have seen over this weekend.
  6. It is the kidnapping of the 17 american aid workers
  7. in Port au Prince.
  8. This happened over the weekend on saturday, october 16th.
  9. It happened down in Port au Prince, that is the
  10. Haitian capital for those of you that didn't hear on
  11. the news or c in social media.
  12. This group was based out of Wisconsin.
  13. They were down there doing missions work for Haiti.
  14. They were in the process of building an orphanage when
  15. they were leaving the orphanage site on saturday they were
  16. taken by a gang.
  17. Um Haiti is a country located in the caribbean and
  18. it borders the Dominican republic.
  19. I have included a map here.
  20. For those of you that may not be geographically comfortable
  21. with where had is at just south of florida along
  22. that chain of islands with cuba and Puerto rico.
  23. Right in the middle is Haiti and the Dominican republic.
  24. They are one piece of land but they're cut right
  25. down the middle.
  26. What is so ironic to me is Haiti in the
  27. last few years, the last 10 years has really become
  28. economically unstable, politically unstable over this summer.
  29. They assassinated their own president.
  30. Uh They have natural disasters that wreck havoc on their
  31. economy and on the people right next to the Dominican
  32. republic. Very well known.
  33. It's quite the tourist destination.
  34. You're surrounded in ocean.
  35. They have beachfront hotels.
  36. Um so the two Places that share one piece of
  37. land that can be so different with just a border
  38. drawn down the middle is crazy to me, Moving on.
  39. I'm going to start the news broadcast.
  40. I chose ACC News broadcast.
  41. They released this the day after the kidnappings occurred.
  42. So 17 October Haitian statistics and contributing factors is what
  43. is next?
  44. I thought it would be most formal to include this,
  45. given that the stats and the factors that I looked
  46. at as to why this may have happened was a
  47. lot of vocabulary that we have used in our assignments
  48. for this class in global health and just through lectures
  49. and material, it's crazy to see a real life scenario
  50. like the kidnappings of these missionaries and see how bad
  51. an economy is ran and how dangerous a country can
  52. be and how a lack of government can lead to
  53. this kind of an event happening.
  54. It's really mind boggling.
  55. So based off of that video, we know that their
  56. intent for kidnap was for ransom.
  57. They wanted a profit.
  58. Why would they want to profit?
  59. Why would they want to endanger these innocent people that
  60. were there helping to rebuild and better their country?
  61. So here's what I found as to the, why 58.5%
  62. of the Haitian population is living below the poverty line.
  63. Um, in regards to that, The gross national income per
  64. capita is roughly $1,700.
  65. I found this little snippet that just goes into how
  66. and why they've been so economically unstable and why gangs
  67. have been able to increase and gain strength and people.
  68. So according to NBC, Haiti is once again struggling with
  69. a spike in gang related kidnappings that had diminished after
  70. President juvenal muise was fatally shot at his private residence
  71. on july 7th And following a 7.2 magnitude earthquake that
  72. struck southwest Haiti in August and killed more than 2200
  73. people. So that just goes to show how economically low
  74. they are right now.
  75. They don't have a president and they've just been struck
  76. with the natural disaster that killed 2200 people more on
  77. that. All of this information comes from NBC News.
  78. The 400 Muoi's oh gang that kidnapped the group has
  79. a history of other kidnappings for ransom, including school Children,
  80. doctors, police officers, busloads of passengers and others as they
  81. grow more powerful.
  82. The 400 muoi's oh gang is located in the anterior
  83. a commune that lies east of the capital of Port
  84. au Prince.
  85. The game controls this commune by force and violence including
  86. carjackings, kidnappings and the extortion of local businesses.
  87. 328 kidnapping victims were reported to Haiti's national police in
  88. the first eight months of 2021 Compared with a total
  89. of 234 for all of 2020.
  90. The kidnapping of the missionaries happened literally days after prominent
  91. US officials visited Haiti and promised 15 million to aid
  92. the Haitian police force.
  93. The fund will be used to reduce gang violence which
  94. this year has displaced thousands of Haitians who now live
  95. in temporary shelters in increasingly unhygienic conditions.
  96. So here in the what next tab since this is
  97. such a new story that just happened, I was lucky
  98. enough that when I started making this presentation, New york
  99. Times just released an update as to what the gang
  100. has said in regards to ransom.
  101. So released by the New York Times on October 19,
  102. 2021, The 400 Muoi's oh have demanded $1 million $17
  103. million. Justice Minister Lizette Quartile said that this is a
  104. sign from the gang to start negotiations.
  105. Mr cattle also mentioned that the gang never offered a
  106. deadline for payment.
  107. He went in to say that this is a positive
  108. thing. The gang that's affiliated with this kidnapping of these
  109. missionaries. They've done kidnappings for ransom before they know the
  110. game. They know to aim high right away and they
  111. know that um they know that negotiations are going to
  112. have to be a part of the process.
  113. That what they first asked for isn't reality, it's going
  114. to have to be a negotiation andre paltry.
  115. The new new york times author noted that most of
  116. the time groups that provide humanitarian assistance in dangerous places
  117. have insurance and it is insurance companies, crisis teams that
  118. negotiate for the release of the hostages that I found
  119. very interesting.
  120. I did not know.
  121. It does make sense, though, when you go to a
  122. war torn country like that, even when you are there
  123. trying to do best for those people, there's a big
  124. chance that they will take advantage.
  125. And then I've just included all of my resources.