Over the weekend, residents of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, have been trying to come to terms with the scourge of kidnapping that has plunged the city into a state of panic. Many wealthier Haitians have already fled the country, and many other people are reported to be considering leaving for the comparative safety of the provinces.

Although the phenomenon has been a growing problem in recent times, it wasn't until April that the number of kidnaps increased significantly. That month, the United Nations peacekeeping mission reported at least 130 cases.

Since then it is estimated that an average of at least four people have been kidnapped every day. Gunmen have targeted people from all social classes, holding their victims hostage until their demands for ransom money are met.

In most cases money is handed over and the victims are released, but a number of kidnap victims have been killed. For example, on Thursday the body of Jacques Roche, a 43-year old journalist, was found lying in a road in downtown Port-au-Prince. He had been tortured and shot dead.

Roche had been kidnapped the previous Sunday, and when friends and family failed to raise the massive ransom demanded, the kidnappers carried out their threat to kill him.

In the wake of Roche's gruesome murder, Haitian political leaders have been quick to blame gunmen loyal to ousted president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The city has been plagued by politically-motivated and criminal violence since the early departure for exile of Aristide and the collapse of his government in February 2004.

Officials from the interim government led by prime minister, Gerard Latortue, have accused pro-Aristide gunmen of a range of criminal acts, including the kidnappings, claiming that their aim is to destabilize the country and wreck forthcoming elections.

On Friday, Raoul Peck, the internationally-acclaimed film maker and former Minister of Culture, accused "mercenaries of former president Aristide" of carrying out Roche's murder. Roche worked on a television show that featured well-known Aristide opponents.

But other commentators believe that there is more to the kidnapping than just politics.

In May, the Haitian police spokesperson, Gessie Coicou, told journalists that a number of police officers were believed to be involved in some kidnappings as a way of making money. Later that same month, one man who works for a reputable non-governmental organization but who requested anonymity out of fear for his own safety, told Hardbeatnews that he had witnessed a kidnapping in the street.

He said, "My first reaction was to reach for my cell phone to call the police. But then I thought I could be connected to a policeman involved in the kidnapping, and he could trace me through my cell phone number." He didn't make the call.

Another theory is that bank employees are passing information to the kidnappers to help them identify wealthy targets. A number of kidnap victims and their families, who have paid ransom demands and secured their release, have reported that their captors knew their precise bank account details and the specific amounts in each account.

The sense that the kidnapping is criminally rather than politically motivated is reinforced by other released kidnap victims' reports that their captors did not speak either of the local languages, Creole and French, and instead conversed in English. Such stories lend credence to the allegation that some of the kidnappers are former criminals recently deported to Haiti by the United States.

Hundreds of convicted criminals who were born in Haiti but left for the USA when children or who were born in the USA of Haitian parents have been deported to Haiti since the mid-1990s.

Since the United States toughened up its immigration laws with the 1996 Anti-Terrorist Act any "criminal alien" - a non-US citizen convicted of aggravated felony or a drug offense - has been subject to automatic deportation on completion of his or her sentence in a US prison.

A version of this article was first published by Hardbeatnews, 18 July 2005 : www.hardbeatnews.com

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