TBILISI. June 5 (Interfax-AVN) - Six UN observes were taken hostage in the Kodori Gorge on Thursday morning, a source in the local government told Interfax.
Unknown individuals disarmed a peacekeeping patrol in the Kodori Gorge and took the accompanying UN observers hostage. The peacekeepers were released, but the UN officials were led away into the forest.
The UN mission to Tbilisi and Georgian law enforcement agencies have no information about the incident as yet.
The hostage taking was confirmed earlier by Georgian presidential envoy Emzar Kvitsiani.
There were plans to sign an agreement with Abkhazia on the return of refugees to villages in the lower part of the Kodori Gorge in the village of Chuburdkhindzhi, Gal region, on Thursday, Kvitsiani said. "It looks like somebody really does not want peace in the conflict area," he said.
However, sources in the government of Abkhazia told Interfax- Military News Agency that four UN observes and three servicemen from the Collective Peacekeeping Force had been kidnapped.
"Four UN observers and three servicemen from the Collective Peacekeeping Force were kidnapped in the upper part of the gorge, which is controlled by Georgia," the source said.
"We have information that the patrol's car came under fire prior to the kidnapping, and the patrol was then disarmed and taken away in an unknown direction," the source said.
This is the third kidnapping of observers in the Kodori Gorge area in three years. In the previous two cases, the kidnappers returned the hostages after negotiations.