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Kidnapped Polish envoy freed in Yemen

SANAA: Poland's ambassador to Yemen has been freed unharmed three days after he was taken hostage by tribesmen demanding the release of a jailed comrade, Yemeni security officials said. The officials told Reuters that ambassador Krzysztof Suprowicz, in his 50s, was handed over to the governor of Sanaa on Saturday and taken to the capital from Khawlan, a mountainous area 60 km east of Sanaa.

Polish embassy officials were not immediately available for comment.

The Yemeni officials said Suprowicz, who was abducted on Wednesday by members of the Beit-al-Qairi tribe demanding the release of a jailed tribe member, was released unharmed.

Officials said the government did not meet any of the kidnappers' demands in exchange for releasing the ambassador.

They said army and police units who had surrounded the kidnappers' hideout had arrested some tribe members in Khawlan to put pressure on the hostage takers.

The abduction was the first of an ambassador in Yemen, a poor Arab state on the tip of the Arabia peninsula. Tribesmen have in the past 10 years kidnapped and briefly held less senior Saudi, French and U.S. diplomats.

Yemen, whose tourism has been shattered by the abductions, has introduced the death penalty to deter kidnappers.-Reuters