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UN to withdraw staff from Darfur ... Cairo's international airport. The reported release followed a deal struck by Egyptian security officials with the kidnappers to let the hostages go, Egyptian state television reported.
The kidnappers had demanded a six-million-euro ransom for the hostages -- to be paid by Germany -- but it is still unclear whether that ransom was indeed paid to secure Monday's release.
The identity of the kidnappers has not been confirmed, but reports speculate the bandits may have been connected with a Darfur rebel group, a faction of the Sudanese Liberation Army.
However, none of the region's rebel groups have claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.
Italy
confirms release Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: The region where the tourists were taken hostage is marked in yellow Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini on Monday confirmed the Egyptian television reports.
"Our compatriots are free, and they are with Egyptian forces," he said, as reported by Italian television station Sky Italia.
"They are in a good shape, they are on their way to Cairo, and then from Cairo to Italy."
Franco said the release was the result of "international cooperation for which we should be truly grateful to the authorities of the other countries that worked with us."
The group -- consisting of five Germans, five Italians and a Romanian -- was kidnapped Sept. 19 while on a desert safari in an isolated south-western region of Egypt.
The group was believed to have been first moved across the border to Sudan to the remote mountain region of Jebel Uweinat, a plateau that straddles the borders of Egypt, Libya and Sudan, before the bandits took them into Chad, according to Sudanese officials.
Sudden shootout In an unexpected turn of events Sunday, gunfire reportedly broke out between Sudanese troops and the hostage-takers after the latter were spotted near the Sudan-Egypt-Libya border area. The clash ended with the death of six of the bandits and the capture of two.
"The problem was solved. They had agreed to the ransom. It was merely a matter of receiving the hostages, but then this surprise happened," an Egyptian security official said.
(Deutsche Welle)
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