Swedish hostage in Iraq 'freed'

Mr al-Yussufi made a video appeal direct to the Pope

A Swedish citizen of Iraqi descent has been released after being taken hostage in Iraq in late January, reports say.

Minas Ibrahim al-Yussufi, Secretary General of Iraq's Christian Democratic Party, was captured travelling from the northern city of Mosul to Baghdad.

Sweden's chief prosecutor, Katarina Johansson-Welin, said police had confirmed his release.

Mr Yussufi had appeared in two video appeals, asking Sweden's King and the Pope to intervene to save his life.

He said his captors, the Iraqi Revenge Brigades-Martyrs of al-Isawy Company, threatened to execute him unless they were paid $4m (£3m) ransom.

"I have been transferred to the execution unit of the Iraqi Vengeance Brigades, which certainly means my death and execution," he said in Arabic, in footage released earlier this month.

Ransom link?

Ms Johansson-Welin broke the news Mr Yussufi had been freed.

"I have received verbal confirmation from police investigating the case that he has been released," she told AFP news agency.

A Swedish police spokeswoman, Linda Widmark, said Mr Yussufi's family said he had been released but did not know if a ransom had been paid.

"We don't have any other details," she was quoted by the Associated Press as saying.

The Swedish authorities have said very little about efforts to secure Mr Yussufi's release.

He had been living in Sweden since the early 1990s, but returned to Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime in 2003.

He was said to have been involved in Iraq's elections, held on 31 January, when he was kidnapped.