The Japanese government paid the Kyrgyz government a $3 million ransom for the release of four Japanese hostages in southern Kyrgyzstan in 1999, but it appears the money never reached the hostage takers, Japanese government sources said Saturday.
The ransom was transported in cash to Kyrgyzstan and handed to the Kyrgyz government, which had been mediating negotiations between the Japanese government and the hostage-takers, an Islamic militant group consisting of Uzbek rebels, the sources said.
The Japanese side's subsequent investigations, however, have found that the militant group did not receive the ransom, and that the money might have been divided by members of the Kyrgyz administration under then President Askar Akayev, who has recently been deposed.