UN hostages released in Kodori Gorge

TBILISI. June 10 (Interfax-AVN) - Three UN mission observers and their interpreter, who were taken hostage in the Kodori Gorge on June 5, have been released without any ransom, a spokesman for the Kodori Gorge administration told Interfax on Tuesday.

He said that a helicopter has left to pick them up.

"The abductors of the UN observers escaped along the route provided by the Georgian authorities," the source said. The hostage-takers took the UN officials to a designated place and left the encircled area, he said.

The former hostages, a Dane, two Germans and their interpreter, a Georgian citizen, will be delivered to the village of Azhara in the Kodori Gorge.