N'DJAMENA, Chad, Dec. 27 (UPI) -- The French Foreign Ministry announced plans to formally seek the return of six French aid workers convicted of attempted kidnapping in Chad.
The four men and two women were members of the French humanitarian group "Zoe's Ark," and were each sentenced Wednesday to eight years of hard labor in prison for attempting to fly 103 children to France in October.
France and Chad, a former French colony, have a 31-year-old agreement regarding the transfer of prisoners, a correspondent for The Times of London reported from N'Djamena.
The French workers had arranged for foster families for the children they mistakenly believed were orphans of the Darfur conflict in neighboring Sudan, their sentencing hearing was told. In fact, the majority of the children who ranged in age from 1-10 weren't orphans or even Sudanese, prosecutors said.
A Chadian citizen and a Sudanese man who assisted the aid workers were sentenced to lighter terms of four years, as "they were victims of deceit" by the French, the prosecutor said.
