KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - A French aid worker captured by the Taleban over a month ago was released on Friday, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said. Eric Damfreville of Terre dÂ’Enfance agency, an organisation helping children in southwestern Afghanistan, was kidnapped in early April along with three Afghan colleagues. Douste-Blazy said the Afghans were still being held hostage. He told a news conference Damfreville had been handed over to French embassy representatives and would undergo medical tests before returning to France. A French female colleague kidnapped along with Damfreville was freed last month.
| Sarkozy said in April he saw no long-term presence for French troops in Afghanistan. |
Taleban spokesman Qari Mohammad Yousuf said Damfreville was freed as a response to payment gesture to new French President Nicolas Sarkozy. “The Taleban Shura (leadership council) decided to free him for the newly elected French president ... had said in his utterances that France will deliberate over withdrawing French troops from Afghanistan,” Yousuf told Reuters by phone from an undisclosed location.
Sarkozy said in April he saw no long-term presence for French troops in Afghanistan. “It was certainly useful that we sent (the troops) in the context of the war against terrorism, but the long-term presence of French troops in that part of the world does not seem to me to be decisive,” he said. France has some 1,100 troops in Afghanistan after withdrawing some 200 elite forces, which had operated under US command, earlier this year. |