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French Hostage, Kidnapped by Islamic Militants in 2011, Is Freed French Hostage, Abducted by Islamic Militants in North Africa in 2011, Is Freed
(about 5 hours later)
PARIS — Serge Lazarevic, a French hostage who was kidnapped in Mali three years ago by Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, has been released, President François Hollande said Tuesday. ISTANBUL — A 50-year-old Frenchman who was snatched from his hotel room in Mali by Al Qaeda’s affiliate in North Africa and held captive for more than three years was released, President François Hollande of France announced on Tuesday.
“Our hostage Serge Lazarevic, our last hostage, is free,” Mr. Hollande said in a video posted on his office’s website. “Now we no longer have any hostages in any country in the world.” “It’s a day of joy,” Mr. Hollande said in a video posted on the government’s website. “Our hostage Serge Lazarevic — our last hostage — is free.”
Mr. Lazarevic was abducted by Islamic militants from a hotel in the Malian town of Hombori on Nov. 24, 2011, along with another Frenchman, Philippe Verdon, a geologist. Mr. Verdon was killed in July 2013 in what militants called a revenge killing to punish France for intervening in Mali in January of that year after Islamic militants seized much of the country. Even as France celebrated Mr. Lazarevic’s return from captivity in the burning sands and craggy caves of the Sahara, questions were being asked about what concessions the French government made to the extremist group, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, that held him.
The Élysée Palace, the office of the French president, said in a statement that Mr. Lazarevic was in relatively good health despite the trying conditions he had endured in captivity. It said he would be returned quickly to France. The liberation of Mr. Lazarevic comes after reports that two militants imprisoned in Mali, including one who was directly involved in the kidnapping of Mr. Lazarevic, were freed as part of a prisoner exchange.
Mr. Lazarevic, a businessman who has dual Serbian and French nationality, appeared in a video on June 2 in which he appealed to Mr. Hollande to help secure his release. In November, he made another appeal in a video that the French authorities said confirmed that he was alive. Officials declined to comment on the terms of the Frenchman’s release, including whether a ransom had been paid by France, where the government has a history of paying millions in cash to win its citizens’ freedom from kidnappers.
The French government did not indicate whether France had paid a ransom to secure Mr. Lazarevic’s release. In the past, the government has vehemently denied that it pays ransoms for French hostages. But it is widely said to make payments through intermediaries in some cases. Jean-Paul Rouiller, director of the Geneva Center for Training and Analysis of Terrorism, who has closely followed Mr. Lazarevic’s case, said that Mohamed Ali Ag Wadossene and Heiba Ag Acherif, two members of a Tuareg clan with close ties to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, had been released from prison, according to Malian government officials.
If there was a prisoner exchange, it again pits France against its allies, including the United States, on the question of how to free hostages held by Islamic extremists. In the past four months, including just this past weekend, four U.S. citizens have been executed by Al Qaeda in Yemen and Islamic State, an offshoot of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
Prisoner exchanges have usually been a secondary request, after ransom, said Mr. Rouiller, who has helped negotiate the release of other Europeans held by the same group that kidnapped Mr. Lazarevic. “They ask for prisoners if they can, but it’s money that is of the essence. Money first, and fellow prisoners second,” he said.
Pierre Martinet, a former French intelligence official, said French citizens would continue to be targeted by kidnappers “because they know it is among the governments that directly negotiates for their liberation.”
“I know very well that we have given money,” Mr. Martinet told the BFM television channel, The Associated Press reported. “It happens. We have to stop lying to ourselves.”
While governments in Europe deny paying ransoms, an investigation by The New York Times found that Al Qaeda and its direct affiliates have taken in at least $125 million in revenue from kidnappings since 2008, of which $66 million was paid just last year.While governments in Europe deny paying ransoms, an investigation by The New York Times found that Al Qaeda and its direct affiliates have taken in at least $125 million in revenue from kidnappings since 2008, of which $66 million was paid just last year.
In November 2011, Mr. Lazarevic and his colleague, the French geologist Philippe Verdon, were grabbed from their hotel rooms in the Malian town of Hombori, where they had gone to study the feasibility of opening a cement factory. The operation was carried out by Mr. Ag Acherif and a relative of Mr. Ag Wadossene, working as subcontractors for Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. According to intelligence officials, the group had issued a “bid” for French hostages because it had experience dealing with the French government: it earned millions of euros in ransom for a French hostage, Françoise Larribe, just a few months earlier, according to one of the negotiators involved in that case.
Within days of their capture, Mr. Lazarevic and Mr. Verdon were handed over to Al Qaeda.
Last year, the kidnappers executed Mr. Verdon when he tried to make contact with an aircraft flying overhead, according to the former negotiator who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the case. Mr. Verdon’s body was later recovered by French soldiers.
Mr. Lazarevic, who is over 6 feet tall and weighed more than 260 pounds at the time of his capture, appeared in several videos pleading for his life. The one released in June alarmed his family because he appeared to have lost as much as a third of his weight. That, and the implicit threat of execution, may have pushed French officials to come to an agreement.