German hostages arrive home

2006-01-02 08:29

Berlin - A former senior German diplomat and his family have arrived home after being freed at the weekend by a group of Yemeni tribesmen who kidnapped them last week.

Juergen Chrobog - a former ambassador and foreign ministry No 2 - and his wife and three children arrived at the airport in the western German city of Cologne on board a special flight.

Earlier, as his family headed home, Chrobog said he still had fond feelings for Yemen despite the four-day hostage drama.

"Despite everything, I love Yemen," said Chrobog, who was snatched on a road in the east of the country on Wednesday.

Chrobog, 65 and his family were released on Saturday after security forces, backed by army solders, laid siege to the kidnappers' hideout in the small village of Al-Saeed and seized four hostage-takers.

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh received the freed hostages at the presidential palace before their departure, and he wished them a happy New Year and assured them their kidnappers would be punished.

Said they weren't terrorists

After meeting Yemen's president, the Chrobog family boarded a Lufthansa plane chartered for their return to Germany, and told reporters they were going home to Cologne.

"We were worried during the first few hours after we were kidnapped. But the kidnappers told us they were not terrorists," Chrobog said, adding that he then felt "reassured".

However, he noted that "during our time in captivity, we saw some children of the tribe were carrying guns when they should have been at school.

"I think that this country's problem is education. Such children should be in schools.

"But, it seems unfortunately that there are no schools (in their region) and so they have to create tribal zones to resolve their problems."

Three Yemeni drivers were freed with the family.

Their release came after mediation efforts by a team made up of tribal chiefs and government representatives who negotiated with the hostage-takers.

Tribal chief Sheikh al-Ahmar Ali al-Aswad was said by tribal sources to have been holding the Germans as bargaining chips for the release of the five brothers he said were wrongly imprisoned by Yemeni authorities.

Three women released

Meanwhile five Italian tourists were reported kidnapped on Sunday in Sirwa in the region of Marib, 170km east of Sanaa.

A government official said three women had been released shortly afterwards and handed to the local government in Marib, while the two men remained captive.

There were several abductions of foreign tourists in Yemen last year. Two Austrians were freed in December after being held for three days.

- AFP