Haiti Police Find Burned Truck of 4 Missing Salvadoran Technicians

The charred remains of a truck used by four Salvadoran military aviation technicians have been found outside Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s National Police said, more than two weeks after the men vanished in a gang ambush. There was no sign of the technicians themselves, according to the Associated Press.

Police posted photos of the burned vehicle, which they said was located Tuesday in the Santo neighborhood of Croix-des-Bouquets, east of the capital, Al Jazeera reported. The area is under gang control. The discovery came during a joint operation by Haitian police, the United Nations-backed Gang Suppression Force and Salvadoran troops.

An ambush and a rapid buildup

The four technicians were serving with the Gang Suppression Force when armed groups attacked them on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince on Oct. 18, UN News reported. Haitian authorities consider them missing, while El Salvador’s government believes they are still alive.

Their disappearance led President Nayib Bukele to send more than 2,000 troops and military hardware to Haiti. On Tuesday, Bukele posted a video he said showed Salvadoran helicopters firing on gangs that were attacking Gang Suppression Force soldiers from Chad. “Gather your gangs so we can go fight with them,” he wrote on X on Wednesday.

Most Salvadoran troops sit outside the UN mandate

UN spokesman Stéphane Dujarric told reporters that only about 200 of the Salvadoran soldiers fall under the Gang Suppression Force, and that the “vast majority” of the additional troops are not deployed under it. He said all security operations in Haiti must follow international law, including human rights law.

Haitian Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé said on Tuesday that the foreign forces operate under Haitian authority. “The international forces did not come to replace the state. They came to support it, to reinforce our capacity,” he said, standing alongside the Salvadoran commander.

The UN-backed force is authorized to have 5,500 personnel, but its numbers remain well below that target, UN News said.

Gang leader wanted by the FBI seeks dialogue

Wilson Joseph, the leader of the 400 Mawozo gang known as Lanmò Sanjou, sent a letter to UN Secretary-General António Guterres asking for talks, according to UN News and the AP. The UN said receiving the letter did not mean it endorsed its contents. The FBI is offering a $1 million reward for information leading to Joseph’s arrest; his gang kidnapped 17 missionaries from the United States and Canada in 2021.

Doctors Without Borders said last week that 30 people, including women and children, were injured in the eight days after the Oct. 18 disappearance as fighting intensified in Port-au-Prince, Al Jazeera reported.

Developing: The four Salvadoran technicians remain unaccounted for, and Haitian police have not said what happened to them after the attack.

Sources: Al Jazeera, The Associated Press, UN News.