Kidnapped South Koreans released in Yemen

Three South Koreans kidnapped in Yemen on Monday were released early on Friday, the South Korean news agency Yonhap reported.

They will be handed over to South Korean diplomats in Sanaa at 0915 (0615 gmt), South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman Lee Kyu-hyong said.

The agency said Yemeni government troops took custody of the kidnapped Koreans from the Al-Hadda tribe in al-Amas, about 150 kilometres southeast of Sanaa.

Director general Song Young-oh of the ministry's Middle East and African Affairs Bureau said that the Koreans were released even though the Yemeni government and the tribe have yet to conclude negotiations on the latter's demands, Yonhap said.

The tribe had demanded the punishment of those who recently raped a Hadda boy and the construction of electricity and water facilities

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.