Freed French hostage expected in Paris

[FastClown]

AFP - A French aid worker kidnapped a month ago in the Afghan capital Kabul was released on Wednesday, a week after he was seen pleading for his life in a hostage video, officials said.

Dany Egreteau, who worked for the Solidarite Laique (Secular Solidarity) charity, was safe at the French embassy in Kabul late Wednesday but there were few details on the circumstances of his release.

"Yes, he's free. He has been freed with the efforts of the Afghan security forces," said Afghan interior ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary. He declined to elaborate.

President Nicolas Sarkozy welcomed the news in Paris and said the aid worker would be flown back home to France late Thursday.

Egreteau had been in Afghanistan only a week, on his first mission to the country, when he was seized by three armed men as he walked through a residential district of Kabul on November 3.

An Afghan who tried to stop the abduction was shot dead.

French authorities last week received a video showing Egreteau with guns pointed at his head and explaining that he was unable to move and forced to wear a blindfold most of the time.

A French foreign ministry spokesman said in Paris that the aid worker "appeared in good health, although he has been shaken" by the ordeal.

Egreteau, who worked in education programmes, had spoken to his parents, said Frederic Desagneaux, the spokesman.

The head of the Solidarite Laique group Egreteau worked for insisted that no ransom had been paid to the kidnappers.