CHRISTO JOHNSON, Freetown | Tuesday 3.20pm
FOUR more hostages arrived in Freetown late Monday following their release by rebel soldiers, leaving 11 still held, diplomatic sources said.
They comprised three unidentified members of the United Nations mission in the west African country and a Sierra Leonean television journalist.
In London the British Foreign Office said the three UN observers were British officers.
More than 30 hostages, including five British soldiers, were seized on Wednesday by soldiers loyal to a former military junta, the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council, which ruled Sierra Leone briefly in 1997-98.
Nineteen hostages were freed Sunday, including seven members of the UN military observer team in Sierra Leone, two journalists, a humanitarian worker, a representative of the Sierra Leonean government and two soldiers of the west African peacekeeping force Ecomog, Unomsil said. — AFP