President Nayib Bukele is pushing back against reports regarding the status of four Salvadoran air technicians who were ambushed and abducted by heavily armed criminal gangs in Haiti. After a nongovernmental organization delivered human remains to a Haitian airport, claiming they belonged to the missing men, Bukele swiftly debunked the assertion.
The president noted that the remains included those of a child and an individual wearing the uniform of a foreign military, as well as identification cards belonging to a soldier from Chad. Bukele’s firm stance directly contradicts earlier reports from the New York Times, which had suggested the badly burned bodies might be the missing Salvadorans.
The four men, part of a UN-backed Gang Suppression Force, were attacked while traveling in an armored vehicle through the Croix-des-Bouquets region, an area currently under the control of violent criminal syndicates.
While the international community struggles to address the total collapse of order in Haiti following the 2021 presidential assassination, Bukele has maintained that his military operation is focused solely on the safe recovery of his personnel.
With over 5,700 casualties reported in Haiti this year alone, the failure of international efforts to secure the nation remains a stark reality. Bukele continues to demand accountability and accuracy as his forces navigate the volatile environment to locate the technicians, who were deployed for medical evacuation support.
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