Guardia Civil frees kidnapped journalist Hichem Aboud

After being kidnapped in the upper area of Barcelona, Hichem Aboud, an Algerian opposition journalist, writer and author of the book ’The mafia of the generals‘ and contributor to Atalayar, has been rescued by the Civil Guard after being found shirtless on the bank of the Guadalquivir River

According to close sources, Hichem Aboud traveled to Barcelona last Thursday – the reason is unknown - until at number 24 of Raset Street four hooded men tied him up and put him in one of the several small cars that were part of the operation. During the trip there were several stops, the longest of 3 hours, in which he was held in a building near the port of Malaga where finally transferred to Seville. In addition to the stopovers, Hichem Aboud was changed cars several times.

Despite being found near the Andalusian capital, the final destination was the port of Malaga where they planned to take him out of the country on a boat.

The Civil Guard detained two people, one of Senegalese origin and the other of Moroccan origin. Of the two arrested, only one of them was part of the kidnapping operation initiated in Barcelona.

Sources from the Guardia Civil assured that they had no knowledge of the case, and that, in the first instance, they thought that it was a drug trafficking operation. 

After his release, he was taken to a medical centre where he was examined. In his first statements after his release, Hichem Aboud said on an Internet channel: 

‘I am in Lebrija, in the province of Seville, Andalusia. I am addressing all those who have missed me during these five days. Here I am with my smile on my face and in good health, thank God. 

I wanted to calm everyone down through this video that I have not been able to publish on my channel because I do not have access to my channel and I am going to publish it here as I have lost all my things, my phones, my computer and everything. And since I have all my accounts well secured and it's hard to access them, I haven't been able to access them either. 

I need to recover the passwords and that takes time and I am going to share all the details of this operation on the Anwar Malek TV channel, this operation that has been carried out through an agreement between the Algerian intelligence apparatus and an international terrorist organisation active in Spain. 

I have no enemy and there is no party willing to pay a very high price to a terrorist organisation to kidnap me. There is no party other than the Algerian regime that can do this because I have no enemies. 

I am protected by God, the only one, and even the intervention of the Spanish authorities has been by God's will in a place where they never used to come’. 

The operation is still in the hands of the Guardia Civil, who are keeping the investigation open to find out what the kidnappers' intentions were and how he was able to get from Barcelona to Seville.