BAGHDAD, Sept. 28 (UPI) -- Wearing headscarves, two female Italian aid workers held for three weeks were turned over to the Italian charges d'affaires, al Jazeera TV reported Tuesday night.
An aid agency spokesman based in Iraq an hour later confirmed that Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both 29, were already on a plane back to Italy and two Iraq workers taken with them had gone home to their families. The two women work for "A Bridge to Baghdad," a group that has been in Iraq for more than 10 years.
"All the NGOs are very excited and happy that the girls are out," the spokesman said from Amman, where virtually all international aid workers went after a recent spate of kidnappings against foreigners. "We understand they were released near a big mosque west of Baghdad."
Jordan's King Abdullah II said Monday the women were safe and would be released, raising hopes that they would be set free. It was never clear who had detained them.
At least two organizations claimed responsibility for their kidnapping and later said on Internet Web sites that they had been killed. The claims were not seen as credible by many agencies who said the Web sites were not associated with previous statements from known terrorist groups.
