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Children stand in the courtyard of the Maison La Providence de Dieu orphanage it Ganthier, Croix-des-Bouquets, Haiti, on Oct. 17.Odelyn Joseph/The Associated Press

A gang that kidnapped 17 members of a U.S.-based missionary group demanded $1-million ransom per person, although authorities were not clear whether that amount included the five children being held, a top Haitian official said Tuesday.

The official, who was not authorized to speak to the press, told The Associated Press that someone from the 400 Mawozo gang made the demand Saturday in a call to a leader of the ministry group shortly after the abduction.

A person in contact with the organization, Christian Aid Ministries, confirmed the $1-million per person demand, which was first reported by The Wall Street Journal. That person spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situation.

The adults range in age from 18 to 48, the children from 8 months to 15 years, according to a statement from the organization on Tuesday. Sixteen of the abductees are Americans and one is Canadian.

“This group of workers has been committed to minister throughout poverty-stricken Haiti,” the Ohio-based ministry said, adding that the missionaries worked most recently on a project to help rebuild homes lost in a magnitude-7.2 earthquake that struck on Aug. 14.

The group was returning from visiting an orphanage when the abduction took place, the organization said.

Canada’s national police force says it is assisting in the rescue effort.

“The RCMP takes this situation very seriously and is collaborating with Haitian and American policing authorities on this incident,” spokeswoman Robin Percival said in an e-mailed statement.

She did not elaborate on the nature of the RCMP’s involvement, but noted that the Mounties have a presence in Haiti through the liaison officers the force deploys abroad and through a United Nations policing program that Canada helps fund in the country.

The Canadian kidnap victim was affiliated with the Canadian branch of the charity, said Ryan Martin, a spokesman for Christian Aid Ministries of Waterloo, Ont.

Mr. Martin would not provide identifying details of the abducted Canadian. “We’re not giving a lot of information out because of its sensitivity.” He added that the charity has been in close contact with Canadian authorities since the kidnapping occurred.

“We are working with the embassy and the RCMP.”

Filings with Revenue Canada show that Christian Aid Ministries of Waterloo was set up in 1984. In 2020, it spent about more than $4-million on its charitable efforts. The charity’s filings say its work was focused on countries such as Haiti, Venezuela, Kenya and Nicaragua.

The Detroit News reported earlier this week that six of the kidnapped missionaries hail from a single family in Michigan, including a mother, a father, and four children under the age of 10.

In response to a recent wave of kidnappings, workers staged a protest strike that shuttered businesses, schools and public transportation starting Monday. The work stoppage was a new blow to Haiti’s anemic economy. Unions and other groups vowed to continue the shutdown indefinitely.

Meanwhile, an ongoing fuel shortage worsened, and businesses blamed gangs for blocking roads and gas distribution terminals.

On Tuesday, hundreds of motorcycles zoomed through the streets of Port-au-Prince as the drivers yelled, “If there’s no fuel, we’re going to burn it all down!”

One protest took place near the prime minister’s residence, where police fired tear gas to disperse a crowd demanding fuel.

In Washington, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday that the FBI was “part of a co-ordinated U.S. government effort” to free the missionaries. The American Embassy in Port-au-Prince was co-ordinating with local officials and the hostages’ families.

“We know these groups target U.S. citizens who they assume have the resources and finances to pay ransoms, even if that is not the case,” she added, noting that the government has urged citizens not to visit Haiti.

It is long-standing U.S. policy not to negotiate with hostage takers, and Psaki declined to discuss details of the operation.

The kidnapping was the largest of its kind reported in recent years. Haitian gangs have grown more brazen as the country tries to recover from the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise and the earthquake that killed more than 2,200 people.

Jean-Louis Abaki, a moto taxi driver who joined the strike Monday, urged authorities in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest nation to act. He said if Prime Minister Ariel Henry and National Police Chief Leon Charles want to stay in power, “they have to give the population a chance at security.”

At least 328 kidnappings were reported to Haiti’s National Police in the first eight months of 2021, compared with a total of 234 for all of 2020, according to a report issued last month by the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti.

Gangs have been accused of kidnapping schoolchildren, doctors, police officers, bus passengers and others. Ransom demands range from a few hundred dollars to millions.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said American officials have been in constant contact with Haiti’s National Police, the missionary group and hostages’ relatives.

“This is something that we have treated with the utmost priority since Saturday,” he said, adding that officials are doing “all we can to seek a quick resolution to this.”

Christian Aid Ministries said the kidnapped group included six women, six men and five children. A sign on the door at the organization’s headquarters in Berlin, Ohio, said it was closed due to the kidnapping situation.

News of the kidnappings spread swiftly in and around Holmes County, Ohio, hub of one of the largest populations of Amish and conservative Mennonites in the United States, said Marcus Yoder, executive director of the Amish & Mennonite Heritage Center in nearby Millersburg, Ohio.

Christian Aid Ministries is supported by conservative Mennonite, Amish and related groups that are part of the Anabaptist tradition.

The organization was founded in the early 1980s and began working in Haiti later that decade, said Steven Nolt, professor of history and Anabaptist studies at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania. The group has year-round mission staff in Haiti and several countries, he said, and it ships religious, school and medical supplies throughout the world.

- With a file from The Globe’s Colin Freeze

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