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14 tourist hostages safe
18/08/2003 09:18 - (SA)
Gao - A group of 14 European tourists held hostage in Mali are safe and should soon be able to join their families, but their final release had been delayed, said a source close to the mediators early on Monday.
"It's a delay, I guarantee that the hostages are safe and that, God willing, they will be with their families very, very soon," said the source.
Officials in northern Mali had said earlier the nine Germans, four Swiss and a Dutchman held hostage for up to six months were freed by their captors on Sunday, but there was no confirmation from their governments or from the Malian capital.
"We have not been able to group all the hostages together," the source said, and that was why an aircraft the mediators had asked for had left, but would return later on Monday.
Germany's public ZDF television had also reported the hostages' release, which it said followed a payment to the kidnappers on Saturday of a ransom, although the station said that the money had not come from the German government.
ZDF said the hostages had been handed over to Malian intermediaries and were at a military airport in northern Mali. But it said the plane was unable to take off for Bamako because of darkness.
Planes waiting for hostages
However, another German public television station, ARD, cast doubt on ZDF's report, saying the operation to free the hostages had been held up due to "technical problems".
It said a plane that left Gao for Tessalit to pick up the captives came back empty as the hostages, who were in separate groups, were apparently not gathered together by the kidnappers.
The Malian military plane was still waiting at Gao airport early on Monday.
A German military aircraft that had been here for a while was waiting at Niamey in Niger, 400km from Gao.
Speculation about an imminent release had been mounting for some days.
Juergen Chrobog, a German foreign ministry state secretary who is Berlin's point man on the crisis, had spoken confidently of a swift and peaceful end after flying to Bamako on Sunday, his third visit to the region.
"We have taken all the measures" for the evacuation, he said.
"I cannot tell you if they will be released tonight, it could take a bit longer.
"But we have high hopes. The fact I have come with a medical plane shows we are confident."
ZDF said Chrobog would accompany the tourists home on the Transall ambulance plane.
- AFP
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