Authorities have released 12 suspects in a kidnapping after they surrendered after a weeklong hostage siege involving four UN military observers, officials said Friday.
The suspects gave themselves up Wednesday after freeing the last of the hostages they seized Feb. 19 in the western village of Dzhikhaskari.
No one was harmed, and President Eduard Shevardnadze’s government had promised to be lenient if the suspects surrendered.
The 12 were interrogated by security officials and freed Thursday after promising to remain in western Georgia. It was not clear if they would be charged with any crime.
“The government has fulfilled its promise,” said the president’s spokesman, Vakhtang Abashidze.
The hostage-takers’ leader managed to escape, even though the house where he and the others were holed up was surrounded by heavily armed security forces throughout the siege.
The captors, followers of the late President Zviad Gamsakhurdia, issued a broad array of demands that included the release of seven comrades jailed in a Feb. 9 assassination attempt against Shevardnadze.
