An official at the Paris prosecutor’s
office said an investigation had been opened into “kidnapping and illegal
confinement by a group linked to a terrorist organisation” as a result of
Vandenbeusch’s abduction.
France’s foreign ministry (Quai
d’Orsay) said no group had yet claimed responsibility and that it was trying to
establish the identity of the kidnappers. Paris considers the region at high
risk for kidnapping and has warned its citizens to leave, but Vandenbeusch had
insisted on completing his mission.
Vandenbeusch arrived in Cameroon in
2011, having previously been a priest in the Paris suburb of Sceaux.
“All must be done and all will be
done so that he can be freed as quickly as possible,” French President François
Hollande said Thursday, speaking during a visit to Monaco.
Hollande has previously denied that
any ransom was paid to free the French family of seven kidnapped in Cameroon
and released last April. But a confidential Nigerian government report seen by
Reuters said that Boko Haram was paid the equivalent of $3.15 million by French
and Cameroonian negotiators.
French media reported that a €20
million ransom had also been paid for the four French hostages abducted in
Niger in 2010 and freed late last month, an allegation the French government strongly
denies.
(FRANCE 24
with wires)
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