John Solecki, CC ’82 and SIPA ’87, was released south of Quetta, Pakistan, on Saturday after being held captive near the Afghan border for more than two months, United Nations official Jennifer Pagonis told the New York Times.
On Feb. 2, Solecki, the top U.N. official in the province of Baluchistan, was kidnapped by gunmen of the Baluchistan Liberation Front who shot his driver as the two were en route to the U.N.’s offices in nearby Quetta.
The kidnappers issued a threat to Solecki’s life on Feb. 13 and released a 20-second video in which a blindfolded Solecki said he was “sick and in trouble.” While the group did not carry out the threat, they released another on March 1, setting the deadline for March 19, in a letter delivered to local news agency Online International News Network. According to news organizations, the separatist group’s spokesman, Mir Shahiq Baloch, wrote that the date was the ”final deadline for killing John Solecki.”
A senior government official declined to go into details regarding the conditions under which Solecki was released. The government would not confirm or deny reports that the Pakistani government had agreed to release some imprisoned militants in exchange for Solecki’s release. But a senior Western diplomat said, “This release could not have been made possible without some trade-off. I am certain Solecki is a free man but in the process the Pakistanis must have released some people sought by nationalists from Baluchistan,” according to CBS News.
During Solecki’s abduction, Columbia administrators closely monitored the situation through news reports, according to Robert Garris, senior associate dean at SIPA. Garris said that SIPA administrators were not in contact with anyone in the U.N. regarding Solecki’s captivity.
“SIPA worked closely with the University’s public affairs office to monitor news on John Solecki, but we were not directly involved in the negotiations for his release,” Garris said.
Little information has been released concerning Solecki’s current condition. But, said Garris, “We are thrilled at the news of his release.”