Olivier Dubois, a journalist held hostage in Mali since 8 April 2021, has been released, according to a statement from the Elysée Palace. The freelance journalist, the last French hostage in the world, was freed along with Jeffery Woodke, an American aid worker who was kidnapped in Niger in October 2016.
Commenting on the circumstances of their release, Niger’s Interior Minister Hamadou Souley said: « On March 20, 2023, after several months of efforts, we obtained the liberation of two hostages who were previously in the hands of the Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM). The statement says that « the hostages were recovered safely before being handed over to the French and American authorities ».
