Most of the 33 Haitian children taken by a US church group in an alleged attempt to move them out of Haiti have family members that survived the earthquake, a care centre chief has said.
The US embassy in Haiti said on Sunday that ten US citizens were being held for "alleged violations of Haitian laws related to immigration."
Earlier, Yves Christallin, the Haitian social affairs minister, said police had arrested five men and five women with US passports in a case that centres on an Idaho-based church group.
The Americans said they wanted to take the quake victims to an orphanage in the Domincan Republic.
Laura Silsby, the head of the group from the New Life Children's Refuge, said the arrests were the result of a mistake.
But Mr Christallin said: "This is an abduction, not an adoption."
The Haitian government has tightened its travel restrictions for children in the country, and said the prime minister will for the time being have to sign off on every minor's departure abroad.
SOS describes itself as the world's largest charity dedicated to orphaned and abandoned children, and has been working in Haiti for seven years. The members of the Baptist group planned to bus up to 100 kids into the Dominican Republic to a place that they were converting into an orphanage Now they claim they didn't have the right paperwork ( i.e. any
) and were unaware of what the regulations required for them to take these children into another country , or that the Haitian government is in too much chaos to sort this out at this point in time
Make your mind up hey - you were either unaware of what you needed to do or made the decision that you knew best
