Jewish American facing death sentence among three repatriated from Congo
Marcel Malanga, Tyler Thompson Jr, both 21, and 36-year-old Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun flew back to Andrews Airport in Washington DC on Tuesday
Jenni Frazer is a freelance journalist
Three American men facing death sentences for their part in a failed political coup have been repatriated to the US from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), after a fraught mercy mission to the DRC capital, Kinshasa, by American-Israeli Moti Kahana and two colleagues.
The men — Marcel Malanga, Tyler Thompson Jr, both 21 — and 36-year-old Jewish American Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun — flew back to Andrews Airport in Washington DC on Tuesday evening.
With the backing of the White House, Moti Kahana, who has a long track record in global humanitarian rescue in areas such as Afghanistan, Ukraine, and Syria, travelled to Kinshasa in mid-March with two business colleagues who formerly worked in the State Department (Stuart Seldowitz) and another who was in the CIA Special Forces.
The intention was to discuss the fate of the three Americans, who were among scores of people who took part in an attempt to overthrow President Felix Tshisekedi last year.
Thirty-seven people were sentenced to death by a military court in September 2024: the Americans’ death sentences were only commuted to life imprisonment last week.
Moti Kahana told Jewish News that his three-day visit to Kinshasa was “among the scariest times of my life”.
He said he was bringing a message from the US to the Congolese president: “If you release the three Americans, it will open a new relationship with the Congo, and the US government can do mineral deals.”
Though he and his two colleagues were originally greeted with a welcoming motorcade, and dinner with the DRC National Security Adviser, Kahana said that at the conclusion of the dinner they were asked for “something in writing” in order to proceed with a meeting with President Tshisekedi. They offered an authorising email from the State Department — which they said was originally accepted — but were then told it was not good enough.
On the next day of their visit, the visiting Americans were driven to a training facility inside a military base and after dinner were asked if they would like to shoot. Kahana and one of his colleagues refused, but the third businessman agreed.
Matters turned more uncomfortable when Congolese officials made repeated demands for the visitors’ passports, which they refused to hand over. Kahana said he thought the passports were needed in order for them to see the president, but the Congolese claimed it was necessary to view the passport pages and show what countries they had previously visited.
“That triggered for me the feeling that something was wrong,” Kahana told Jewish News. They made contact with the American embassy in the DRC and it was agreed that they should make copies of their passports to show to the Congolese.
“When the official showed up, we gave him the copies, but he said he needed us to go with him because ‘we had entered a military base and begun shooting with no permission.’ I said that we had been invited and driven there by the Congolese, and offered the opportunity by them to shoot. We also did not know it was a military base to begin with”.
There were repeated attempts, according to Kahana, to get the visitors “to come with them for 10 minutes”. The embassy advised them that the Congolese seemed to be looking for an opportunity to arrest them and said that they should leave the DRC as soon as possible.
Kahana said that he and his colleagues finally got on an Air France flight leaving Kinshasa and watched as Congolese military vehicles drove onto the tarmac in a vain attempt to stop the plane.
He expressed immense gratitude to the American embassy in the DRC for their support and advice during their visit.
But despite the apparent failure of Kahana’s mission, the three young Americans facing execution were told a week ago that their death sentences were to be commuted to life imprisonment. In fact, a colleague of Kahana’s visited Kinshasa after his team’s escape and delivered the original message which Kahana had been due to give to the president. So, ultimately, he was successful in his bid to rescue the three young men.
Now the men have been flown back to the US where it is believed that some agreement has been brokered that they will serve time in American prisons.
Marcel Malanga, one of the three, is the son of Christian Malanga, a Congolese opposition figure who was one of the leaders of the foiled coup. Malanga Senior was killed while resisting arrest during the attack on the presidential palace; his son told the DRC authorities that his father had forced him to take part. Tyler Thompson, from Utah, is apparently a friend of Marcel Malanga and flew to the DRC under the impression he was getting a free holiday. Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, meanwhile, is reportedly to have known Christian Malanga through a gold mining company.
Now it seems that the mooted talks on minerals from the Congo for the US, in exchange for security provided by Americans, may well take place. The threat of a renewed presidential coup has not gone away and the DRC needs help in putting down rebel forces.
Last week the DRC president Felix Tshisekedi held productive talks with the visiting US senior adviser for Africa Massad Boulos — who also happens to be the father-in-law of Donald Trump’s daughter, Tiffany. It was in the wake of those talks that the American death sentences were commuted.
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