New Delhi: The Indian priest abducted by Islamic militants in Yemen five months ago is safe and the government has taken all necessary steps for his safe release, India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said.
The minister revealed this when the family members of Fr Tom Uzhunnalil met her in New Delhi on August 4 evening. The relatives of the 57-year-old priest from Kerala came to the capital to plead with her to take emergency measures for the 57-year-old priest’s safe release.
The meeting took place in the backdrop of news reports that the Yemeni police have captured three militants, who belonged to the gang that abducted Fr Uzhunnalil and killed 16 people at an old-age home of Missionaries of Charity in Aden, southern Yemen.
The terrorists were caught from Saila near Aden. According to reports, the arrested belonged to Al-Qaeda, an Islamic terrorist group. The gang, which admitted that they were behind the attack, did not reveal any details about Fr. Uzhunnalil.
It was reported earlier that the Islamic State was behind the kidnapping.
A week earlier, the Ministry of External Affairs told reporters that it had not succeeded in getting any information on the whereabouts of Fr Uzhunnalil.
According to reports, the Indian Mission in Yemen was working with the local authorities to ascertain information about the priest.
A video clipping allegedly to be Fr Uzhunnalil’s surfaced on Facebook in July. The video allegedly showed the priest undergoing torture at the hands of his abductors.
The video had allegedly put pressure on the Indian government to renew efforts to free the Salesian priest.
Swaraj told parliament on July 20 that the government was verifying the authenticity of the video that appeared in social media a day earlier.
She also told the Lok Sabha (people’s council), the lower house of parliament, that the government is making an all out effort to secure the priest.
“The matter has been taken up with whichever country we thought could help us, not just at my level but at the level of the Prime Minister too,” Swaraj said when some members brought the house’s attention to a photograph and a video that first surfaced in Fr Uzhunnalil’s Facebook account.
The video shows a blindfolded man being assaulted by some others. The photograph shows a fairly weak, white bearded man holding his hands crossing his heart.
Swaraj had earlier admitted that it was difficult to deal with cases where people are held hostage in a hostile territory with little information about their current whereabouts. There is no single entity one can approach and settle the matter.
She cited the example of Jesuit Father Alexis Premkumar Antonysamy, who was released from captivity eight months after he was abducted by the Taliban at Herat in Afghanistan in June 2, 2014. He was released on February 22, 2015, after relented efforts of the Indian government.
What has come as a hindrance in Fr Uzhunnalil’s case is that India had to relocate its embassy in Sanaa, Yemen in April 2015 to Djibouti after ISIS took control of a major part of Yemen and it spiraled into turmoil.
India had made repeated requests to Indians to leave conflict-ridden Yemen. It had carried out an extensive evacuation process Operation ‘Raahat’ in which 6,688 people were evacuated from Yemen, including 4,741 Indians and 1,947 foreign nationals by air and sea routes last year.
Father Tom is believed to have stayed back saying he is committed to carry out his duty to God.