Confusion surrounds the whereabouts of two Orthodox archbishops kidnapped on Monday and reportedly released on Tuesday. The latest reports claim the archbishops have not been released, while it remains unclear who abducted them.
The archbishops’ driver, identified as a deacon, was killed, while a fourth passenger escaped.
Yohanna Ibrahim and Boulos Yazigi, respective heads of the Syriac and Greek Orthodox Churches in Aleppo, were traveling back from the Turkish border following negotiations over two bishops kidnapped in February, Michel Kayyal (Armenian Catholic) and Maher Mahfouz (Greek Orthodox).
This latest kidnapping comes a week after Ibrahim told the BBC that there was no targeting of Christians in Syria during the rebel uprising. Yet on April 17, Greek Melkite Catholic Patriarch Gregory III Laham told the press that more than 1,000 Syrian Christians have been killed and 20 churches destroyed.