Saturday, May 17, 2008 - 10:00
AFP News Briefs ListKidnapped Pakistani envoy to Afghanistan recovered safe: official
Pakistan's ambassador to Afghanistan kidnapped by suspected Islamic militants more than three months ago has been recovered safe, a senior official and state television reported Saturday.
Envoy Tariq Azizuddin was heading to the Afghan capital Kabul with his driver when he disappeared in the troubled Khyber tribal district bordering Afghanistan on February 11.
The state-run Pakistan television, quoting unnamed sources, said "the ambassador has been recovered safe," but did not provide details.
A senior security official told AFP that the ambassador was recovered late Friday from the custody of a local Taliban group just outside the Khyber tribal district.
"He is safe and sound," the official who could not be identified said.
The release came nearly four weeks after Azizuddin appeared in a video aired by Dubai-based Al-Arabiya news channel in which he said he was being held by the Taliban.
He said in the video that he had been taken with his driver and bodyguard who were also shown sitting beside him, while three gunmen stood in the background.
Azizuddin had pleaded in the video to the government and the foreign ministry "to do all they can to protect our lives and to answer all the demands of the Mujahedeen of Taliban in order to secure our release."
The day of his kidnap coincided with Pakistani security forces seizing a senior Taliban commander, Mullah Mansoor Dadullah, in southwestern Baluchistan province, also bordering Afghanistan.
Images
TV grab taken on April 19, 2008 from Al-Arabiya shows Pakistan's kidnapped ambassador to Afghanistan, Tariq Azizuddin who has now been freed
© 2007 AFP Al-Arabiya
