A Belgian woman kidnapped by bandits in south-eastern Iran has been freed, a Belgian foreign ministry spokesman and an Iranian commander said on Wednesday. The Belgian woman and her male companion were kidnapped on Sunday by a group led by a man named Ismael Shahbakhsh, who demanded that his jailed brother be freed in return for their release, Iranian officials said.
The two tourists were travelling by car in an area between the historic city of Bam and Iran's border with Afghanistan and Pakistan when they were seized, Iranian news reports said.
Earlier on Thursday, an Iranian commander told IRNA news agency that the woman had been freed. "Efforts by the (a military) base are continuing to free the other hostage," Colonel Mohammad Javad Asna-Ashari was quoted as saying. Iran's Fars News Agency cited an "informed source" as saying both were freed in an operation on Wednesday morning.
The Belgian foreign ministry spokesman said there was no confirmation that the Belgian man had been released. "That is news to us. We can confirm that one person, the female, has been released," he said.
"But we have no confirmation that the man has also been released and we are still working to secure his freedom." On Tuesday, the spokesman said the kidnapped man had phoned his mother to tell her they had both been freed, but reports in Iran suggested their abductors had orchestrated the event.
"We cannot say why this happened. The problem is getting first hand information," the foreign ministry spokesman said. The Belgian authorities have not yet named the two kidnap victims, but Belgian media named them as 35 year-old Carla Van den Eeckhout and 28 year-old companion Stefaan Boeve from the Flemish town of Aalst.
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