France’s last remaining hostage, Serge Lazarevic, arrived home yesterday after three years at the hands of Muslim militants, to be greeted by his family and French President Francois Hollande.
The beaming 51-year-old, dressed casually in a blue hooded top, was welcomed warmly by Hollande at a military airport outside Paris before an emotional embrace with his mother and sister.
Lazarevic, sporting a closely cropped beard, shared a joke with Hollande and the rest of his family after exiting the jet with his daughter.
“I had forgotten what it is like to be free. I will never forget it again,” Lazarevic told reporters. “Be careful, because freedom is dearer than anything. When you’ve been taken, when you’re being abused, when you’re lost, when you’re close to death, you think more about life,” he added.
Hollande said it was “an enormous joy” to see him back on French soil.
“Welcome back, Mr Lazarevic, we’ve been waiting for you for three years,” the president said.
Lazarevic was expected to be taken immediately to a military hospital for checkups before returning to his family, according to a diplomatic source.
“The doctor gave him a checkup on the plane and he’s doing well,” the source said.
Lazarevic was the last of more than a dozen French citizens who had been taken captive in recent years, with those held in Africa reaching a high of 15 last year. Four journalists held by Syrian Muslim militants were released earlier this year.
Lazarevic was freed after intensive efforts by Niger and Mali. There was no immediate information on how the release was secured or whether France paid a ransom.
Lazarevic was snatched by armed men in Mali on Nov. 24, 2011, while on a business trip with fellow Frenchman Philippe Verdon in a kidnapping claimed by Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).
Verdon, who suffered from an ulcer and tachycardia — an abnormally fast heartbeat — was found shot dead last year, and those close to his family suggested he had been executed because he was weak.
Speaking in the capital of Niger after meeting with Nigerien President Mahamadou Issoufou following his release, Lazarevic said: “I lost about 20 kilos, but I’m in fine shape. I would like to thank the president of Niger [and] the people of Niger, who worked with France for my freedom.”
A Malian security source said the final stages of Lazarevic’s release had taken place in the northern desert city of Kidal.
“I won’t say if there was a ransom payment or liberation of prisoners,” the source told reporters.
In his three years in captivity, Lazarevic appeared in several AQIM videos, including one last month in which he said he was gravely ill and believed his life was in danger.
While the details of Lazarevic’s release were not given, France has repeatedly denied paying ransoms despite being accused by other Western nations of using back-channels to do so.
“France does not pay ransoms, nor does France engage in prisoner exchanges,” Hollande said in September.
However, he added: “This does not mean that countries do not do it. It has happened that some countries, to help us, do it. That I concede.”
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