63-year-old Jörg Lange can now “return to his family”, says Bianca Kaltschmitt, president of the aid organization Help, for which Lange worked at the time of his disappearance.
It was in April 2018 that he was kidnapped by gunmen on motorcycles near Ayorou in western Niger, a region near the border with Mali that is regularly attacked by Islamists.
His Nigerian driver was released shortly after the crime, but according to German media, Lange is said to have been sold to the Islamic State branch in the Greater Sahara instead.
German security sources tell Der Speigel that Lange is “in good health given the circumstances” and that he was brought back to Germany on a military plane. According to the same sources, the Moroccan security service should have facilitated the release thanks to its contacts within the jihadist milieu in the Sahel.
Germany’s government is said to have considered freeing the 63-year-old with the help of military special forces, but concluded that the plans were too risky.
At least four more citizens from Western countries are still being held hostage in the Sahel, but the figure is based solely on the cases that have been made public.
Thousands of people have been killed in the conflict in the Sahel, which began in Mali in 2012 and spread to Burkina Faso and Niger in 2015. More recently, the Gulf of Guinea has also been attacked by Islamists.