More U.S. missionaries and other Americans who got stranded in Haiti after criminal gangs overran the country in late February have been rescued after weeks of waiting as a new report from the United Nations described the troubled Caribbean nation’s condition as “cataclysmic.”
“Structural and conjectural factors have led Haiti to a cataclysmic situation, characterized by deep political instability and extremely fragile institutions,” the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a report released Monday.
“Corruption, impunity, and poor governance, compounded by increasing levels of gang violence, have eroded the rule of law, and brought State institutions, which should be the basis of a democratic society, close to collapse. The impact of generalized insecurity on the population is dire and keeps on deteriorating.”
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The report comes as some U.S. missionaries who had been pleading for help and prayers after they got trapped in the government collapse reported that they were finally rescued.
In a post of Facebook Sunday night, Jill Dolan of Love A Neighbor ministry who has been working as a missionary in Haiti since October 2013 with her husband, Ryan, reported that she was among those waiting to be rescued.
“It was in the middle of the 23rd night that we received a call that actually came to fruition. A call requesting us to meet at this particular landing zone at a particular time. Desline and I both were more hopeful than ever before! ‘God did it,’ Desline said,” Dolan wrote.
“That morning I was on the phone with my husband about to see our daughter Sarah in her wedding dress. The helicopter coming for us swooped down and it was time to move. Desline and I hadn’t told anyone about the possibility of the helicopter coming for us so as to not get anyone’s hopes up. However, as I was expressing how beautiful Sarah was, we couldn’t hide the fact that we were boarding a helicopter,” she added. “I couldn’t hear them, but I could read her lips and Sarah asked, ‘Are you on a helicopter?’ It all of a sudden happened so fast and our whole family was brought to tears, relief, and elation. Desline and I were finally being evacuated! Praise God!”
Dolan said she arrived in Florida at about 9 p.m. Saturday. She also confirmed in another statement on Facebook that the situation in Haiti has deteriorated and she had to leave behind several children she was in the process of adopting.
“The crisis in Haiti reaches way beyond just where the gangs are present. The stronghold on the country and the ability for goods and gasoline to travel freely throughout the country have been greatly impacted. Skyrocketing prices, business shutdown, banks closed … the list goes on. Just when we think it can’t get worse in Haiti it does,” she wrote.
“The five in our family who were stuck in Port-au-Prince for 24 days are out of harm’s way. However, we leave behind our three children that we are in the process of adopting as well as over 200 kids in our care at the orphanage,” she noted, encouraging support for a GoFundMe campaign.
Natalie Cross was also recently rescued after traveling to Haiti last month as part of a group of nine missionaries with Mission of Grace.
“We went to help serve a mission that just moved 200 orphans up into the mountains to keep them safe,” Cross told WFTV 9.
She explained that even though she ended up spending longer than the two weeks she had planned as part of her missionary work in Haiti, she felt at “peace” while she was stranded because “God told me to go.”
“For me, it was just knowing that I was there because God told me to go. So, I’ve just had a peace the whole time,” she said.
Approximately 500 Floridians were stranded in Haiti after the crisis erupted and officials told WFTV 9 that about 185 of them have been rescued so far. Despite the peace she felt as she waited in Haiti, Cross said she is “excited” to be home.
“It’s been a long day. It’s been a long week, but we’re super excited to be this far. And we’re just, we’re grateful,” she said.
According to the UNHCR report, the Haitian population is now “severely deprived of enjoying its human rights.”
“The recent escalation of violence has heightened human rights abuses, including killings, kidnappings, and rapes, especially against women and young girls. It has also precipitated the humanitarian catastrophe and further deepened the political deadlock, undermining the peace, stability and security in Haiti and the region,” the report said.
“The crisis has precipitated basic services, including the health system to a near collapse. A total of 18 health institutions are no longer operating in the capital region, as they are located in areas affected by armed gangs, including the Haitian State University Hospital (the reference hospital for the whole country) and the sanatorium, which used to house over 100 tuberculosis patients,” officials said.
“The same applies to certain regions of Artibonite, where gang violence has prevented the functioning of more than 10 health institutions. According to OHCHR, hospitals have been set ablaze, medical personal killed, injured, and kidnapped and there is a shortage of basic medical supplies.”
Hunger is now a significant threat, according to Jean-Martin Bauer, the U.N.’s World Food Programme (UNWFP) country director for Haiti, who said 1.4 million people are “a step away from famine” according to UN News.
“The violence has displaced nearly 17,000 people in Port-au-Prince between March 8-14, and has impeded the delivery of humanitarian aid. The situation of the violence on children is particularly worrying,” the report said. “Not only children are being killed during gang attacks and caught in crossfire, but they are also increasingly used by gangs to carry out armed attacks.”
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