Kidnapped Dominican diplomat freed in Haiti

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP) — A diplomat from the Dominican Republic had been freed four days after being kidnapped in neighboring Haiti, the Dominican foreign minister said Wednesday.

The minister, Roberto Alvarez, said in a tweet that Carlitin Guillen Tatis had been released “safe and sound,” though he did not give further details.

The Dominican government had said in a weekend statement that Guillén Tatis, the agriculture counselor at its embassy in Port-au-Prince, apparently was kidnapped on Friday while travelling toward a border crossing.

Ambassador Faruk Miguel Castillo said Guillén Tatis apparently was kidnapped in the Haitian capital’s Croix-des-Bouquets district — a stronghold of the 400 Mawozo gang that kidnapped 17 people from a U.S. missionary group in October and held most of them until December.

In what may have been an unrelated development, Haiti’s National Police announced that one of the top leaders of the 400 Mawozo gang, Germine Joly, was extradited to the United States on Tuesday aboard an FBI plane.

It said he faces U.S. charges involving smuggling, import of weapons of war and kidnapping.