Bukele Says Haiti Gangs Hold 4 Salvadorans and Orders Rescue
El Salvador's president says four of his country's service members are being held hostage in Haiti, and he has sent troops to get them back. Nayib Bukele said Haitian gangs are holding four Salvadoran members of the UN-backed Gang Suppression Force (GSF), and announced on Wednesday, Oct. 21, that a military operation to rescue them had begun. He gave no operational details and did not say which gang holds the men. The episode is the sharpest test yet for a mission that has roughly 2,000 personnel on the ground against an authorized strength of about 5,500.
The ambush came on Sunday, Oct. 18, in the Croix-des-Bouquets area on the northeastern edge of Port-au-Prince, where the Kraze Barye, 400 Mawozo and Chen Mechan gangs operate. Gunmen attacked a Salvadoran armored vehicle as it returned to base. U.S. Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz told the Security Council the vehicle was struck by hundreds of bullets and explosives and set on fire. The four men escaped the burning vehicle on foot and then lost contact with their unit. Salvadoran helicopters sent to find them came under fire, and Waltz said U.S. officials believe all four survived.
El Salvador's ambassador to the UN, Egriselda Lopez, described the missing men as aviation technicians rather than infantry. The Salvadoran armed forces said repeated land and air attempts to reach the area were hampered by the intensity of the fighting, and GSF spokesperson Igor Rugwiza said the mission was still searching. UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric called for the men's immediate and safe release. The GSF told residents of the area to stay indoors.
By Wednesday the language had shifted from "missing" to "hostage." Bukele warned that a more forceful response would follow if the men were not returned alive and unharmed, and Haiti's government called their release an absolute priority. In a statement posted on X, Bukele said the men are not combatants, that the Salvadoran contingent consists only of pilots and technical personnel whose main job is medical evacuation, and that they were taken while returning after buying food at a market. He told gang leaders that El Salvador had finished with gangs at home and could finish with them in Haiti too.
Reports diverge, and several claims remain unverified. Reuters and AP counted four missing personnel, but Bloomberg LÃnea reported five soldiers missing, citing local press, and described a pickup truck rather than an armored vehicle. As Bloomberg described it, the GSF's own statement did not mention missing personnel at all.
The Salvadoran daily El Mundo, citing the Haitian newspaper Le Nouvelliste, reported that the men were captured by the Chen Mechan gang after wandering into gang territory by mistake while looking for a supermarket, without notifying Haitian police. That account is unconfirmed, and it conflicts with the market-trip description Bukele gave. Reuters also noted that its report offered no independent evidence of the hostage-taking, which rests on Bukele's announcement. No group has claimed the attack and no demands have been made public. Outlets variously call the men soldiers, air force members and technicians; the common thread is that they are aviation personnel.
The UN Security Council authorized the GSF in September 2025 to replace a struggling Kenyan-led mission and, unlike its predecessor, it can make arrests. Its first troops arrived on April 1, 2026, and Al Jazeera reports that operations officially began June 1. Contributing countries named across reports include Chad, Guatemala, Jamaica and El Salvador, and some accounts add Sri Lanka and Mongolia. Authorized strength is reported as either 5,500 or 5,550.
Gangs control about 70 percent of Port-au-Prince, according to AP and Al Jazeera. UN figures cited by AP show more than 5,700 people killed or injured and more than 230 kidnapped from January to mid-September. UN envoy Carlos Ruiz Massieu told the Council that more than 1,000 people were killed and over 100 abducted between July and September. GSF chief Jack Christofides said hostile incidents against the force have risen and that gangs are testing it.
