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WORLD NEWS Wednesday 2 august 2023

Efforts to help Haitians suffer new blow with kidnapping of

American nurse and daughter

By EVENS SANON and MI- emergency personnel to
CHAEL CASEY leave, citing widespread
Associated Press kidnappings that regularly
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) target U.S. citizens.
— Efforts to help Haitians Kenya’s Foreign Ministry
survive the gang violence said Saturday that it had
ravaging their nation suf- offered 1,000 police to help
fered a new blow with the train and assist the Haitian
kidnapping of an American National Police “restore
nurse from New Hampshire normalcy in the country
and her young daugh- and protect strategic in-
ter, who remained missing stallations.”
Tuesday. Most Haitians say they sim-
Haiti’s gangs have grown in ply want to live in peace.
power since the July 7, 2021 Protesters, largely from the
assassination of President area around El Roi Haiti’s
Jovenel Moïse and are campus, which includes
now estimated to control a medical clinic, a school
up to 80% of the capital. and more, echoed that call
Hundreds of people have Monday as they walked
been reported kidnapped through the sweltering
since January, a significant streets wielding cardboard
uptick from previous years. signs written in Creole in red
The surge in killings, rapes Students from the El Roi academy carry signs during a demonstration to demand the freedom of paint.
and kidnappings has led to New Hampshire nurse Alix Dorsainvil and her daughter, who have been reported kidnapped, in “She is doing good work in
a violent uprising by civilian the Cite Soleil neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Monday, July 31, 2023. the community, free her,”
vigilante groups. Associated Press read one.
Around 200 Haitians had has forced many to close, brick clinic late last week practice of the gangs kill- Jean Ronald said his com-
marched in their nation’s leaving thousands of vul- when armed men burst in ing and sowing terror in munity has significantly
capital to show their anger nerable families without and seized her. Lormina Haiti’s impoverished popu- benefitted from the care
over the abduction of Alix access to basic services like Louima, who was waiting lace. Hundreds of kidnap- provided by El Roi Haiti.
Dorsainvil, who was work- health care or education. for a check-up, said one pings have occurred in the As the protesters walked
ing for nonprofit Christian Doctors Without Borders an- man pulled out his gun and country this year alone, through the area where
ministry El Roi Haiti when nounced this month that it told her to relax. figures from the local non- Dorsainvil was taken, the
she and the girl were seized was suspending services in “When I saw the gun, I was profit Center for Analysis streets were eerily quiet. The
Thursday. The kidnapped one of its hospitals because so scared,” Louima said. “I and Research in Human doors to the clinic where
woman is the wife of El Roi some 20 armed men burst said, ‘I don’t want to see Rights show. The same day she worked were shut, the
Haiti’s founder Sandro Dor- into an operating room this, let me go.’” Dorsainvil and her daugh- small brick building empty.
sainvil. Nonprofit groups are and snatched a patient. Some members of the com- ter were taken, the U.S. Ronald and others in the
often the only institutions in Witnesses told The Associ- munity said the unidenti- State Department advised area worried the latest kid-
Haiti’s lawless areas and ated Press that Alix Dorsain- fied men had asked for $1 Americans to avoid travel napping may mean the
the deepening violence vil was working in the small million ransom, a standard to Haiti and ordered non- clinic won’t reopen.q

U.S. restricts visa-free travel for Hungarian passport holders

because of security concerns

By BELA SZANDELSZKY
Associated Press
BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — The United States imposed new travel restrictions on citizens
of Hungary on Tuesday over concerns that the identities of nearly 1 million foreigners
granted Hungarian passports over nine years weren’t sufficiently verified, according to
the U.S. Embassy and a government official.
The restrictions apply to the U.S. Visa Waiver Program, which allows passport holders
from 40 countries to enter the United States for business or tourism without a visa for up
to 90 days.
The validity period of travel for Hungarian passport holders under the Electronic System
for Travel Authorization was reduced from two years to one year, and each traveler
will be limited to a single entry into the United States. They are the only such restrictions
among the 40 participating states in the Visa Waiver Program.
A senior U.S. government official said the change followed years of failed efforts by the
U.S. to work with Hungary’s government to resolve the security concerns. The official
spoke anonymously in order to candidly characterize diplomatic engagements.
American and Hungarian national flags fly in downtown Hundreds of thousands of Hungarian passports were issued without stringent identity
Budapest, Hungary, on Wednesday, June 21, 2006, with the
historical parliament building at the background. verification requirements, some of them to criminals who pose a safety threat and have
Associated Press no connection to Hungary, the official said.q