Three Italians kidnapped in 2022 freed in Mali

ROME (Reuters) – An Italian couple and their son, who were kidnapped in 2022 by an Islamist militant group in Mali, were freed late on Monday, the Italian government said.

Rocco Langone, Maria Donata Caivano and Giovanni Langone had been living in a Jehovah’s Witnesses community in the southern city of Koutiala when they were seized by a jihadist group allied with Al Qaeda militants.

The government said their release had been secured by the Italian intelligence agency AISE and the foreign ministry, thanks to their contacts with tribal representatives and Malian intelligence. It gave no further information.

“Despite their long imprisonment, the members of the Langone family are in good health,” the government said, adding that they were due to return to Rome later on Tuesday.

The couple were in their 70s and their son was in his 50s at the time of their abduction, a spokesman for the Jehovah’s Witnesses church said in 2022.

Mali has struggled to contain a decade-old battle with Islamist insurgents that has destabilised the region, with militants using the country as a launch pad for attacks across West Africa’s Sahel region and into its coastal neighbours.