This website and all package domain you-internet for sale! Contact e-mail: office@norbnet.co.uk
Al-Qaeda releases Spanish hostage in Mali
BARCELONA, Spain — A Spanish aid worker released by Islamist militants in Mali flew home on Wednesday after a four-month kidnap ordeal, saying she had been well treated by her captors…
BARCELONA, Spain — A Spanish aid worker released by Islamist militants in Mali flew home on Wednesday after a four-month kidnap ordeal, saying she had been well treated by her captors in the desert."I am happy to be home" but "need time to recuperate," a smiling Alicia Gamez said in a brief statement after stepping off a Spanish air force plane at Barcelona airport.Dressed in jeans, sneakers, a pink T-shirt and a black jacket, she appeared in good health and showed no obvious signs of her ordeal."What I want to do now is to rest and, above all, to be with my family," said Gamez, 39, who was accompanied on the flight by her brother and Secretary of State for International Cooperation Soraya Rodriguez.She appealed for the release of the two other hostages who were seized at the same time, Roque Pascual and Albert Vilalta."My happiness will be complete when Albert and Roque come home as well," she said.The three Spanish workers for aid group Barcelona Accio Solidaria were kidnapped in Mauritania in late November, after which they were taken to northern Mali.Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) on December 8 claimed responsibility."I want to say that both are well, we have been well treated, with respect and well looked after, within the very hard limits of the desert," Gamez said.The Spanish press reported several weeks ago that AQIM had demanded a ransom for the release of the three aid workers and the daily El Mundo said Madrid was in the process of paying five million dollars (3.7 million euro) in exchange for the hostages.But Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega denied that a ransom had been paid.She said there was "no objective reason" why Gamez was released while the two men were not."This sometimes happens in this type of kidnappings. They freed Alicia first, we would have liked them all to be released at the same time," she told a news conference Wednesday.Diplomatic sources in Mali said an Italian woman who was kidnapped along with her husband in Mauritania in December w
last modification 2010-03-10 20:15:19
Add comment