Bangladeshi hostage freed in Afghanistan: NGO

DHAKA, Dec 8, 2007 (AFP)

A Bangladeshi charity worker kidnapped in Afghanistan has been released nearly three months after his abduction, an official said in Dhaka on Saturday.

Nurul Islam, who works for Bangladesh's biggest non-government organisation, Brac, was set free by his abductors late on Friday night and taken into the custody of Afghan authorities, Brac spokesman M. Anwarul Haq said.

"Preliminary reports indicate Nurul Islam is in perfect health. He will be handed over to us after some health check-ups," Haq said in the Bangladeshi capital.

He gave no other details about Islam's release.

Islam, 39, was seized in broad daylight on September 15 from the Brac (Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee) office near Kabul.

Police later arrested four people in connection with the kidnapping.

After his abduction, an Afghan television station aired videotape showing a blindfolded man said to be the kidnapped Bangladeshi national and said his abductors threatened to cut off some of his limbs unless a ransom was paid.

It said the men who delivered the tape did not say whether they were with the insurgent Taliban movement, which has been behind a string of abductions of Afghan and foreign nationals in Afghanistan.

The Taliban have tried to use hostages to barter with the government and have killed a number of them -- mostly Afghans.

Crime has soared in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban government in 2001, with regular reports of Afghans kidnapped by ransom-seekers.

Brac is the biggest private charity working in the war-torn Afghanistan since 2002. It also operates a bank in the country.

The charity employs 4,700 people, the majority of whom are Afghans, in the health, education and micro-credit sectors.

"We enjoy a tremendous amount of goodwill in Afghanistan. We're the biggest charity there. Persistent pressure by the Afghan government coupled with our request led to Islam's release," Haq said.