Algiers Province, Algeria - January 22, 2025 The Spaniard Joaquín Navarro, kidnapped in Algeria on 14 January and released on Tuesday 21 January, said on Wednesday in Algiers that he is still in a ‘state of shock’ because of the ‘complicated’ moment he has gone through and asked for a few days to be able to recover a state of calm and tranquillity’.

A Spanish man kidnapped by an armed group in the turbulent Algeria-Mali border area thanked the Algerian authorities on Wednesday after his rescue. Identified as Joaquin Navarro, the Spaniard had been on a trip last week when he was kidnapped "by an armed group made up of five people",

BAMAKO, Mali (AP) — A rebel alliance in Mali said Tuesday it has freed a Spanish man who was kidnapped in southern Algeria last week. The Azawad Liberation Front, or FLA, a coalition of separatist armed groups in Mali’s predominately Tuareg north, said on X that it freed Spanish citizen Gilbert Navarro.

General Lounes Magramane (center), Spain's Ambassador to Algeria Fernando Morán Calvo-Sotelo (left), and Spanish tourist Navarro Giane Gilbert