Bukele threatens Haiti gangs that ambushed Salvadoran soldiers if they are not returned

Haiti admin October 22, 2026 0 Comments

Bukele threatens Haiti gangs that ambushed Salvadoran soldiers if they are not returned

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele is demanding the release of four Salvadoran military personnel ambushed by an armed gang in Haiti, warning that the gangs would face his wrath if the men are not returned alive and unharmed.

“Do not take our word for empty threats,” Bukele wrote on X on Wednesday, breaking his silence on the attack, which occurred on Sunday. “We have already finished with the gangs in El Salvador, and we can finish with you too.”

The men, aviation technicians deployed with the United Nations-authorized Gang Suppression Force in Haiti, have been missing since the attack. There has been no word on whether they were killed or are still alive after the Armed Forces of El Salvador said in a statement that they had escaped the ambush.

Bukele’s warning, which was written in Haitian Creole, comes as the gang-fighting force intensifies operations in Santo, Croix-des-Bouquets, in search of the men. A gang stronghold, the expansive area east of Port-au-Prince, not far from the U.S. Embassy, has seen troops search for the men by air and on foot. The Salvadorans had been out shopping and were returning to camp after visiting a supermarket in the Santo 19 area when their armored white Toyota came under a hail of gunfire by the Chen Mechan gang, later reinforced by members of 400 Mawozo, part of the powerful Viv Ansanm gang coalition.

The gunmen used an explosive device, setting the vehicle on fire. Since then, there has been no word on the whereabouts of the four men.

Bukele said that El Salvador had launched a military operation to rescue the men. He did not provide details, leaving unclear if he was referring to the support Salvadoran helicopters were already providing to the force as part of the ongoing search operations or if he intends to deploy additional troops to Haiti. Also unclear is whether any additional deployment would be a separate mission or within the framework of the gang-fighting force, which was recently renewed for six months by the U.N. Security Council.

“We have a single objective: to bring our four compatriots back home alive, without any harm,” Bukele said.

Earlier in the week, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Mike Waltz, also put Haiti’s powerful armed gangs on notice, warning the “cowardly “attack will not deter the forces’ mission to root them out.

“Armed thugs have robbed Haitians of their most simple freedoms: working an honest job, walking their own streets, sending their children to school without fear,” he said during Monday’s U.N. Security Council briefing on Haiti. “But they are clearly ready to attack the international community, who is sent there by this council, to protect the civilian populace.”

Despite the crisis in Haiti, the Trump administration, which terminated Temporary Protected Status in late July for more than 300,000 Haitians living in the U.S., on Thursday sent another deportation flight to the Caribbean nation. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement charter flight was scheduled to arrive in Cap-Haitien from Alexandria, Louisiana, shortly after noon.

Haitian officials have remained silent on the missing Salvadorans, which is raising concerns about deploying foreign soldiers into the chaos at a time when the gang-fighting force is facing delays in reaching its full deployment strength of 5,500. Frustration is also growing over what is seen as Haitian authorities’ reluctance to get their house in order, from tackling corruption to fixing its judiciary.

Bukele, one of two Latin American leaders with troops on the ground in Haiti, was initially reluctant to deploy his aviation unit. He had even proposed having the unit either remain in El Salvador or in the neighboring Dominican Republic during negotiations with the Biden administration to have his Central American nation contribute troops to the gang force’s predecessor, the Kenya-led Multinational Security Support mission.

“Our kidnapped men are not combatants,” he said Wednesday. “They are aviation technicians who are part of our mission in Haiti, within the framework of an international mission.”

The Salvadoran contingents consisted only of pilots and technical personnel, whose primary job is to carry out medical evacuations and save lives, “not to wage war,” the president added. He described the attack on the men as “cowardly.”

Speaking directly to gang leaders, Bukele issued a stark ultimatum: “Understand one thing very clearly: Today’s attack is nothing compared to what is coming if we do not get all four hostages back alive.”

But he did offer gangs a way out: “We still have time to avoid this. Return our four compatriots to us alive, without any harm, and everything will go back to how it was before the kidnapping. The decision is in your hands.”