Saturday, July 20, 2013
Two Spanish aid workers for Doctors Without Borders who were
kidnapped in Kenya by Somali militants and held hostage for nearly two
years arrived home Friday, the group said.Montserrat Serra and
Blanca Thiebaut were met by relatives after their arrival at an air base
in Madrid, it said. Somali militants kidnapped them from the Dadaab
refugee camp in eastern Kenya in Oct. 2011 and shot and wounded their
Kenyan driver.
The attack was the third kidnapping of Europeans in
Kenya in six weeks and a reason Kenya gave for sending troops into
Somalia days later.
The organization, also known by its French name Medecins Sans
Frontieres, announced their release Thursday, but declined to reveal
whether a ransom had been paid. It gave few other details, citing
security concerns for staff in Somalia and ongoing abduction cases.
"We
feel it would be inappropriate and insecure of us to provide details
relating to captivity or to the ransom," Will Robertson, the group's
program manager, said in Nairobi, Kenya. "What I will say is that we've
had a lot of support from many stakeholders within Somalia and we are
very grateful for their assistance."
Speaking in Madrid, the group's leader in Spain, Jose Antonio Bastos, said the two women were healthy.
The
plane picked the two up in Djibouti but Bastos did not say how they got
there or how the release was arranged. Robertson said he had "no major
information" on where the women were held in Somalia or by whom.
The
abductions came as Somalia was suffering from a famine that killed more
than 250,000 people and made it difficult for the organization to
respond to the country's needs, Robertson said.
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/19/3508033/freed-spanish-aid-workers-en-route.html#storylink=cpy