At least 389 kidnappings were recorded in Haiti in the first three months of the year, human rights group CARDH said, three times as many as in the fourth quarter of 2022, as gangs try to recoup losses due to international sanctions.

The abductions recorded between January and March are more than triple the 127 recorded by CARDH in the previous quarter and up 72% from the same period last year.

The group, based in Port-au-Prince, said in a report that the “exponential increase” in kidnappings may be due to the gangs’ need to compensate for the loss of income caused by international sanctions, which have been imposed at the end of the year last year.

Countries such as the US and Canada have imposed sanctions on a number of high-ranking politicians and businessmen believed to be funding and arming the gangs, which now control most of Haiti.

CARDH added that the increase in kidnappings may be due to the creation of new alliances between gangs through which they increase the areas they control and at the same time expand “the kidnapping industry” in them.

The organization also noted that another reason may be gang retaliation against citizen groups that protect communities from gangs, instead of regular police.

“Gangs use extreme violence (any kind of torture) to force parents and families to pay large sums in US dollars,” he said, referring to hanging abductees, gang-raping or causing burns.

Of the 389 abductions recorded by CARDH, 29 involved citizens of foreign countries. The State Department said it is in contact with Haitian authorities about the March 18 abduction of a Florida couple who went to the country to visit relatives.

In all of 2022, the organization recorded 857 kidnappings, a decrease compared to the 1,009 it had recorded in 2021, the year in which Haitian President Jovenel Moise was assassinated, leaving a power vacuum that the gangs exploited.