::2 Female Italian Hostages Free::
 

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Italian women taken hostage in Iraq now free
CTV.ca News Staff

Two Italian women taken hostage in Iraq earlier this month were among eight people released Tuesday by their captors.

Italy had been gripped by the kidnapping of aid workers Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29. They were seized on Sept. 7th by a group demanding that Italy withdraw its troops from Iraq.

Last week, two groups claimed in a website statement to have killed the women. But the Italian government was quick to reject such reports.

"Finally a moment of joy," Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said, announcing the release in Parliament in Rome. "The two girls are well and will be able to return to their loved ones tonight."

Two Iraqi hostages -- Raad Ali Aziz and Mahnaz Bassam -- who were seized along with the two Italian aid workers were also released on Tuesday.

Pari and Torretta had been working for the organization Bridge to Baghdad. They working on school and water projects for the aid agency "Un Ponte Per ..." ("A Bridge To...")

"I gave the families the news a short while ago," Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said in a televised statement on Tuesday. "They are well."

Berlusconi informed the Italian government of their release earlier Tuesday. The news was greeted by applause. The Italian PM thanked Al-Jazeera, as well as the intelligence agencies of neighbouring countries.

Meanwhile, four Egyptian telecommunications workers kidnapped in Baghdad last week were freed, their parent company said. Two other abducted at the same time remain in captivity.

More than 140 foreigners have been taken hostage in Iraq. Some of them have been beheaded, others are still missing and a few lucky ones have been released.

Canadian Fairuz Yamulky, who was born in Baghdad, was held for 16 days by her captors before being released last Tuesday.

She was able to ensure her escape with the help of one of her captors, after she managed to convince him to set her free, in exchange for a promise of help resettling him in Canada.

"I was never 100 per cent sure that I trusted that man -- that he wasn't going to take my life," she told CTV's Janis Mackey Frayer in an exclusive interview.

There is still no word on the fate of Briton Kenneth Bigley. He was kidnapped on Sept. 16, along with two American colleagues, by the Tawhid and Jihad group which is led by al Qaeda militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The group is demanding that female prisoners be released from Iraqi jails, and have already beheaded the Americans -- Eugene Armstrong and Jack Hensley.

Over the weekend, a statement posted on a website claimed that Bigley had been killed. However, the British Foreign Office described the site as "discredited."

"We don't think it's anything to be taken too seriously," the British Foreign Office said in a statement.

With files from The Associated Press