Haiti: Bukele says remains found are not those of the four missing Salvadoran soldiers

Earlier in the day, The New York Times reported that doctors were examining the remains to determine whether they belonged to the four Salvadoran aviation technicians missing since an ambush on 18 October. According to the paper, the bodies were found six days after the attack, in a gang stronghold. Scott Reece, a former US State Department security official whose US-funded medical evacuation organisation, Hero Client Rescue, was hired to retrieve the remains, confirmed the discovery. Three other sources stressed to the paper that the victims' identities had not been established.

According to Bukele, a non-governmental organisation delivered the remains to the international airport, saying they belonged to the four technicians. But, he wrote, they correspond to a child, a man considerably taller than the missing soldiers and a person wearing part of a uniform from another army. Identity cards and military uniforms from other countries were also reportedly found among the remains. Photos posted with his message show a Gang Suppression Force (GSF) badge and a Chadian identity card. NAGO could not independently verify these details, and the GSF had not commented by Saturday evening.

The four soldiers, aviation technicians deployed with the GSF, went missing on 18 October in Croix-des-Bouquets, when gangs attacked the armoured vehicle taking them back to their base. El Salvador has since sent special forces to Haiti to search for them in the Cul-de-Sac plain.

Their fate remains unknown. Bukele's statement raises another question that no one has yet answered: whose remains were found on Saturday, including, according to him, those of a child?