Journalist and Scholar Freed in Syria

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/09/world/middleeast/journalist-and-scholar-freed-in-syria.html

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ROME — An Italian journalist and a Belgian scholar, both kidnapped in Syria in early April, have been released and are on a plane flying to Italy, the Italian government said Sunday.

The Web site of Turin-based La Stampa, which employs the journalist, Domenico Quirico, also said he was flying back home.

The government said the Belgian, Pierre Piccinin, a historian and teacher, was released with Mr. Quirico and flying back with him, bound for Rome’s Ciampino airport.

Italy’s prime minister, Enrico Letta, told La Stampa’s editor, Mario Calabresi, “Our hope was never extinguished and all the efforts put in place for a positive outcome were crowned with success.”

Details of their cases have not been made public. In Syria, abductions of journalists — by government-allied militas, rebel groups and criminal elements — have increased sharply this year.

Mr. Quirico, 62, worked in African hot spots including Libya, Sudan, Darfur and Mali, and had been kidnapped in August 2011 along with three other journalists when he tried to reach the Libyan capital Tripoli.

Mr. Quirico went missing in April after entering Syria from Lebanon, his fourth trip into the country, without a visa. He was traveling between Damascus and Homs when he disappeared.

He was able to briefly call his wife on June 6, apparently from the former rebel bastion of Qusayr, southwest of Homs.