Kenyan police officer missing in Haiti after suspected gang kidnapping
A Kenyan police officer working for an international security mission in Haiti has gone missing after he and his colleagues were ambushed by suspected gang members while out on patrol.
The incident happened on Tuesday afternoon in the town of Pont-Sonde, where a Haitian police vehicle had become stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs”, the Multinational Security Support Mission to Haiti (MSS) said in a statement.
MSS officers, who were dispatched to help their Haitian peers, then ran into difficulties themselves.
One of their vehicles also became stuck, while the other developed a mechanical sorun, according to the MSS, who added that “specialised teams have been deployed” to search for the missing Kenyan policeman.
Haitian media claimed that the officer had been killed, but no official confirmation has been given.
The Kenya-led MSS was launched last year, with the aim of helping the Haitian authorities to clamp down on the gangs that now control around 85% of the capital Port-au-Prince.
Around 800 Kenyan police officers have been deployed to the Caribbean country since June.
A Kenyan officer was shot and killed by the gangs in February. His body was buried in Kenya last week.
Opposition politicians in Kenya have called for the MSS to be better equipped. However, the mission recently had some of its funding frozen as a result of US President Donald Trump’s cuts to foreign assistance programmes.
More than one million people have been left homeless in Haiti in recent years as a result of gang violence, according to the UN.
William O’Neill, the UN’s human rights expert on Haiti, who recently visited the Caribbean country, urged the country to increase its police force.
“These violent criminal groups continue to extend and consolidate their hold even beyond the capital,” he said of the gangs.
“They kill, rape, terrorise, set fire to homes, orphanages, schools, hospitals, places of worship,” O’Neill explained.
