Silver Lining
Haiti arrests 10 US citizens for child smuggling and US denies entry to quake-hit Haitians
Posted on January 31, 2010 by realistic bird
by Carlos Latuff
Haiti arrests 10 US citizens for child smuggling
Sun, 31 Jan 2010, Press TV
The Haitian police have arrested 10 US citizens after they tried to take 33 Haitian children out of the earthquake-stricken nation.
One of the suspects, who says she is the leader of an Idaho-based charity called New Life Children’s Refuge, denied they had done anything wrong.
The suspects were detained at Malpasse, Haiti’s main border crossing with the Dominican Republic, after Haitian police conducted a routine search of their vehicle.
The Haitian authorities said the 10 US citizens had no documents to prove they had cleared the adoption of the 33 children — aged 2 months to 12 years old — through any embassy and no papers showing they were made orphans by the quake in the impoverished Caribbean country.
In addition to outright trafficking in children, Haitian officials have also expressed concern that legitimate aid groups may have flown children believed to be orphans out of the country for adoption before efforts to find their parents had been exhausted.
As a result, the Haitian government halted many types of adoptions earlier this month.
Cash-strapped US denies entry to quake-hit Haitians
Sat, 30 Jan 2010, Press TV
The US military puts a stop to Haitian earthquake victims entering America for medical attention, due to cost concerns over the victim’s treatments.
Officials say the decision follows some government concerns about who will be footing the medical bill for the quake victims.
They say Florida and Georgia have made it clear that they cannot afford hosting quake victims without federal help.
“Florida stands ready to assist our neighbors in Haiti, but we need a plan of action and reimbursement for the care we are providing,” said Sterling Ivey, a spokesman for Florida Governor Charlie Crist.
While Crist’s request does not clearly stated the cost of medical care for the earthquake victims but according to Reuters the cost will amount to millions of dollars.
The airlift operations from Haiti were suspended on Wednesday.
American rescue services say medical facilities have been set up in Haiti and offshore to treat the injured.
“The fact that medical flights aren’t taking place does not mean that Haitians who need care aren’t getting it,” said Navy Captain Kevin Aandahl a spokesman for the US Transportation Command, which manages the military’s medical emergency airlifts.
“We have the medical facilities again on the island as well as offshore.”
The devastating magnitude-7.0 earthquake that rocked the impoverished Caribbean nation on January 12 killed at least 170,000 people.
WHY STEAL THE ORGANS WHEN YOU CAN STEAL THE WHOLE CHILD
January 31, 2010 at 11:02 am (Chutzpah, Crime, Haiti)
Photo by Reuters
Americans arrested taking children out of Haiti
The five men and five women were in custody in the capital, Port-au-Prince after their arrests on Friday night. There are fears that traffickers could try to exploit the chaos and turmoil following Haiti’s January 12 earthquake quake to engage in illegal adoptions.
One of the suspects, who says she is leader of an Idaho-based charity called New Life Children’s Refuge, denied they had done anything wrong.
The suspects were detained at Malpasse, Haiti’s main border crossing with the Dominican Republic, after Haitian police conducted a routine search of their vehicle.
Authorities said the Americans had no documents to prove they had cleared the adoption of the 33 children — aged 2 months to 12 years — through any embassy and no papers showing they were made orphans by the quake in the impoverished Caribbean country.
“This is totally illegal,” said Yves Cristalin, Haiti’s social affairs minister. “No children can leave Haiti without proper authorization and these people did not have that authorization.”
U.S. authorities could not be reached for immediate comment on the arrests.
But Laura Sillsby from the Idaho group told Reuters from a jail cell at Haiti’s Judicial Police headquarters, “We had permission from the Dominican Republic government to bring the children to an orphanage that we have there.”
“We have a Baptist minister here (in Port-au-Prince) whose orphanage totally collapsed and he asked us to take the children to the orphanage in the Dominican Republic,” Sillsby added.
“I was going to come back here to do the paperwork,” Sillsby said. “They accuse us of children trafficking. This is something I would never do. We were not trying to do something wrong.”
In addition to outright trafficking in children, authorities have voiced fears since the quake that legitimate aid groups may have flown earthquake orphans out of the country for adoption before efforts to find their parents had been exhausted.
As a result, the Haitian government halted many types of adoptions earlier this month.
There are no reliable estimates of the number of parentless and lost children at risk in Haiti’s quake-shattered capital.
(Editing by Peter Cooney)
Source Via Uruknet
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