BAMAKO: A South African paramedic who had been held by jihadists in Mali for over six years has been released, security and humanitarian sources said on Sunday.

Gerco van Deventer, 48, was kidnapped in Libya on Nov 3, 2017, on his way to a power plant construction site around 1,000 kilometres south of the capital Tripoli.

Three other Turkish engineers seized at the same time were freed seven months later, but van Deventer remained in captivity and was moved to Mali. “We learned that the South African hostage was released the day before yesterday,” a Malian security source said.

A foreign humanitarian source said that van Deventer was released on the border between Mali and Algeria, adding that she had briefly met the freed hostage at the border. The security source said van Deventer was currently under observation at a hospital in Algiers.

His wife Shereen van Deventer said that she did not wish to comment immediately, saying they were “a little overwhelmed as a family” by the news and the number of calls. The two sources confirmed information given by an influential South African charity, Gift of the Givers, which was involved in mediation efforts for his release.

Published in Dawn, December 18th, 2023